National standards in K-12 education

[alan1]

You are not alone in that position Mountain Man, and that's why I brought up the topic. This is where we are headed, and only us "insiders" are being told. I think it's a HUGE issue that will be ignored until it's too late. Google "PARCC" and you will see there is very little information.

189,000 results when I google "PARCC", 710,000 results when I google "MountainMan" and 341,000 results when I google "chanel". That kind of puts things in perspective. There isn't a lot out there.

 

[chanel]

MountainMan has twice as many as chanel? It's a man's world, I tell ya.

 

[chanel]

New Jersey high school students will need to pass as many as 12 end-of-year tests to earn their high school diplomas, under a plan unveiled today that’s designed to ensure "a New Jersey high school diploma is a meaningful measure of college and career readiness."

The new tests are part of the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, an effort in which 24 states, including New Jersey, joined forces to institute a new set of assessments to match common core standards. PARCC has a $185 million federal grant to develop tests in language arts and math for students in grades 9-11.

New Jersey now spends $32 million a year on assessments and will use that funding for the new tests, Barra said.

Gov. Christie introduces new N.J. high school testing program | NJ.com

Follow the money....

 

[Samson]

committed to building a next-generation assessment system.

PARCC states collectively educate about 25 million public K-12 students in the United States.

What brought all of these states together is a shared commitment to develop an assessment system aligned to the Common Core State Standards that is anchored in college and career readiness; provides comparability across states; has the ability to assess and measure higher-order skills such as critical thinking, communications, and problem solving; and provides truly useful information for educators, parents, and students alike.

PARCC States | PARCC

Today I attended a workshop on the common core curriculum standards which were adopted by NJ last year (unbeknownst to the teachers) and will be implemented next Sept. The NJ state assessment "High School Proficiency Test" will be replaced by the "PARCC".

No one could answer my question about HOW MUCH THIS WILL COST THE TAXPAYERS OF NJ. No one could explain why the taxpapers of NJ were now being ask to PAY FOR A NATIONAL TEST. No one wanted to discuss whether or not we are now moving toward a FEDERAL EDUCATION system, as opposed to a state one.

I realize these are big questions, with big implications for the future, and a big price tag. No one likes to answer big questions, and I wouldn't be surprised if I'm called into the principal's office because I had the AUDACITY to ask. So I will ask the smart people here on USMB what you think.

Are we heading toward a nationalized educational system, and if so, is that reasonable and/or doable?

Disgusted right now.

The Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers is a group of states. It is not a Federal Program.

However, the Feds ARE trying to weedle their way into a "National" testing program with subsidies to the AP test. Interestingly, no matter how much money they spend, the same number of students pass the AP (about 700,000); However, the failure rate is skyrocketing.

 

[chanel]

Semantics. It is voluntary right now, but it is federal money.

As far as the AP scores, there are a lot of issues. In many NJ schools, borderline students are kicked out of the class because they may affect the passing rate. And if teacher evaluations are going to be based on student test scores, we will see participation in the program drop dramatically.

According to this article, my suspicions were correct. There is little correlation between standards and achievement.

Will the Common Core State Standards improve student achievement? Not according to a new study out today.

The crux of the argument in the Brookings Institution report is that there is not much of a connection between standards—even rigorous ones—and student achievement. If there was a connection, we would have seen signs of improvement from states' own individual standards—all states have had standards since 2003—but NAEP scores don't bear that out, author Tom Loveless argues.

Study: Common Standards Will Not Affect Student Achievement - Curriculum Matters - Education Week

 

[psikeyhackr]

The word science is mentioned once in this thread.

Where is it ever specified the minimum that an 8th grader should UNDERSTAND about science? And the minimum that a high school graduate should understand on the subject?

So they can make some standardized tests but where is the general public ever told what is supposed to be comprehended to pass those tests?

Shouldn't an 8th grader be able to explain what an atom is and what makes elements different. It is discussed in this science fiction story.

Omnilingual by H. Beam Piper
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psik

 

[DGS49]

Of course testing does not improve results. The operative principle is that testing identifies strengths and shortcomings in educational outcomes, and allows planners to address them, thus improving results in the future.

But this is all thwarted by the teachers' unions who react to standardized tests about the same way Dracula reacts to sunshine. In their make-believe world, standardized testing is BAAAAAAAD because test scores can be affected by things other than the competence of the teachers, so teachers must never be held accountable for outcomes. Every standardization program that is ever proposed is fought both overtly and covertly by the teachers' unions, because they threaten accountability.

If teachers were the "professionals" that they want us to think they are, they would be in the forefront of developing these tests, to ensure that the subject matter is relevant, the presentation of the test is age-appropriate, the scoring is repeatable and reliable, and so forth.

But no. They whine about having to "teach to the test," they complain that the results are invalid, they complain about wasting classroom time. Anything to prevent the ONE REAL POTENTIALITY for improvement - getting rid of bad teachers.

Sometime just for fun, call the HR person at your local school board and ask her (him) for the number of teachers in your school district who received "unsatisfactory" performance ratings (other than for blatant misconduct). You will never get a straight answer, but let me tell you anyway: "Zero."

'Nuff said.