Pearson Gets It Right - in Urdu as Teachers Pulled From Schools to Mark Faulty Tests

Pineapplegate continues, with 20 more errors, and finally an apologia from Pearson

News round up at NYC PubSchl Parents blog: http://goo.gl/dOOBJ 

But is it too late? Includes video news report from Central NY, which says that errors have forced rescoring of the exams, costing cash-strapped districts even more money!

---- Leonie Haimson on the NYC Parent blog

Picky, picky, picky Leonie. My sources say that there were no mistakes on the Pearson tests in Urdu, Hindi, Magyar, Macedonian, and a couple of obscure Amazon rain forest Indian dialects.

today Pearson leaked another memo to NY1, admitting that they had screwed up royally and that an internal investigation is underway: "Pearson agrees that we need to work diligently to improve."  Is this too little, too late?  As Lindsey Christ, NY1 reporter, rightly points out:

Chancellor Tisch said she will give the company one more year. However, some parents and teachers want the state to cancel the company's five-year, $32 million contract. They say students don't get a second chance with high stakes tests, so why should the test company.

Yes, let's close Pearson's contract down due to poor performance. Just like they close down schools. Pearson has been double dipping -- or rather 20 times dipping by getting paid to design tests by many states but using the same questions.

And there are field testing coming up in many schools in June -- subjecting our kids to tests that have no other purpose than to help Pearson build more tests and make more money. Shouldn't the teachers and students get a cut? Or just boycott.

Here are some reports about teachers being pulled out of schools to mark exams, losing even more days of instruction. The outrages continue.

Our last day of five ELA teachers out of building is tomorrow. Thursday starts the five math teachers per day. That only lasts one week. With normal unexpected absences we have had up to 9 teachers out of building on any given day. The DOE thinks that's okay. Had another testing consequence come my way today when an eighth grade parent asked about their child having multiple subject tests on the same day. I know that having tests on same day is not ideal, but I pointed out that it has been three weeks since some teachers could give any tests on the material they have been teaching in their classes. One of the aspects of the data driven nonsense of the past decade has been the absolute disregard of "data" collected by teachers. Teachers are always taught to find multiple ways to assess their students, keeping portfolios of various types of assessments, upon which report card grades can be derived. This work seems more and more to be considered worthless. We all know the idea of any standardized test is to normalize results across diverse populations, but what is taught everyday must also be assessed. As standardized testing takes on more and more value, teacher generated data will not only be more and more ignored, it will be harder and harder to find the time to creatively assess students. One can imagine, thinking about the disgusting piece on Joel Klein in todays NY Times (we learn from Regent's boss Tisch that Klein admires Murdoch!!), how his company will be soon at the door of school districts across the country with products designed to remove all creativity from the work of teachers with a suite of digital products, designed like baby food, for easy digestion and predictable results.

-------

Well, those of us parents who have boycotted the standardized tests are advocating among other things the principle that the primary assessments of students should be made by the education professionals who are working with them every day -- their teachers. That's how it was when I grew up in Indiana, where the only standardized test I had before the SAT was one 1-2 hour test in fourth grade that had no preparation and no consequence. The idea that teachers would not be considered competent to determine whether their students were ready for the next grade would have been inconceivable; that's exactly what teachers do and know better than anyone else! As long as standardized tests are usurping the rightful place of teacher's assessments and evaluations of their students, our family will be having no part of them, regardless of the DOE's policies.

--------

I just spent the past 10 days grading ELA tests. As an SETSS teacher, that means that the children I see missed 10 days of mandated services according to their IEPs. I will, of course, record this in my SESIS report, but I think it's inexcusable for teachers providing mandated services to be sent to mark tests! 

From Monty Neil at Fair Test: Testing in the News -- May 7 - 9, 2012
Lots of interesting stories as the annual K-12 "testing season" reaches its peak. 

A Glimpse of Technology Enhanced Tests (be sure to read the comments)
      http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/curriculum/2012/05/experts_who_work_on_technology.html

Kentucky is First State to Implement Common Core Tests
      http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20120505/NEWS01/304290101/kentucky-schools-testing

Physical Fitness Impacts Test Scores
     http://www.nola.com/education/index.ssf/2012/05/children_who_are_fit_tend_to_d.html

No College Left Behind -- The "Holy Grail" Test Does Not Exist
     http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/college-inc/post/no-college-left-behind-a-guest-post/2012/05/08/gIQAnkypAU_blog.html#pagebreak

More Mistakes on State Tests -- Lots of Errors in Translating Math Exam
     http://www.ny1.com/content/top_stories/160845/mistakes-on-translated-state-math-exams-add-up

Accountability for Test Errors -- Great Letters-to-the-Editor
     http://www.newsday.com/opinion/letters/letters-doubts-about-state-s-tests-1.3704666

Tracing Test-Cheating Scandals to Their Roots
    http://blogs.ajc.com/jay-bookman-blog/2012/05/09/tracing-the-test-cheating-scandal-back-to-its-roots/

Chancellor Condemns Exam Errors -- Will Still Use Flawed Scores for "Accountability" (Except for Testing Companies)
    http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/education/chancellor-merryl-tisch-condemns-testing-mistakes-article-1.1074997

Walcott Denies Parent Choice - to Opt Out of High Stakes Tests

So tonight CEC6 met with Chancellor Walcott and, among other issues, we raised our concerns with the negative impact that high stakes testing is having on our children's education.  I'll spare you the (much abbreviated) rationale we offered for our concerns, but we proposed that the DOE develop a policy for parents who wish to opt their children out of the high stakes tests in a non-punitive fashion so that our children do not suffer (more).  His response, according to someone who wrote it down: "No I won't accept that resolution." Well, there you have it; the Chancellor will not support a DOE policy that will allow us parent the CHOICE to opt our kids out and avoid the mind-numbing, educationally stunting test prep and testing that dominates the 6 weeks post-February break.
Nice.   ----- NYC Parent

Well of course Choice is only used by ed deformers when it refers to charters. Parent choice to opt out of tests or make a choice to call for lower class size over spending big bucks on Tweed consultants.

Don't you think all politicians should publish their SAT scores before they can run for office? Just a thought. And an ugly one at that. Even more ugly:  male politicians should publish their penis size. After all, since they are going to fuck us the public has a right to see the data on the equipment.

Then there's the test mania, pineapples, opting out (come to the Change the Stakes meeting on Weds. at CUNY at 5:30, rm 4202).

Here are just a few tidbits:

A NYC parent:

My husband, a middle school teacher whose classroom routine was
interrupted for state testing, is now removed from the classroom for
five days to grade the ELA tests. Actually, one day is spent training
him to grade the tests. While he's away, his classes are covered by a
substitute teacher, hired by his principal. This is yet another waste
of already-shrinking school budgets and masks the economic impact of
all this testing, since the DOE doesn't have to absorb this cost. The
school does. Additionally, the kids aren't learning from their
teachers!

And other NYC Parents

Yes- it is unacceptable- and to boot schools can choose instead to pay a heft fee to NOT send teachers to correct exams.

 This is the system in place since 2008 when Deputy Chancellor Grimm, at the time head of Finance,  announced among other "huge cuts to the central budget"  that more money would go to schools /classrooms.

 One of these "savings" was ' a new way to correct the assessments'.

 Well, when we dug just a little we learned that the supposed tens of millions in savings was just an offload of the costs to correct the test from central accounting to the schools!

 Instead of centrally hiring teachers outside of school time and paying them per session as HAD been done, now schools were supposed to send in a number of teachers (proportionate to testing grades/ regardless of size/configuration) to correct the tests during the school day for weeks at a time.

 I traced this new expense in my district schools and found:

  an elementary school that had spent tens of thousands of dollars in funding on subs to cover the test correcting teachers taken form the classroom (after English and before the math tests);

  a high needs middle school that did w/o ESL or special ed instruction for 2 weeks in order to send those teachers, instead of core classroom teachers, to correct the tests;

  and even a brand new MS that only had a 6th grade staff/students in its first year but had to send staff to correct 6, 7, 8th grade exams.

---------

Of course there was no check/balance or any type of  authority or watch dog to even catch the DoE at these tricks. Which is how they get away with it!

I have the second group of five teachers out for the next five days at my school and spent the school day running around making sure subs were doing what teachers off grading had requested. A complete waste of time. An outrage which seems to have outraged no one. The money stolen from schools, the loss of class time, the fact that teachers whose job is to teach must spend their time being trained to grade these mediocre tests. I find all of this far far far far worse than another single day of field testing in June. You give six days of lousy tests and then remove teachers to grade for 15 school days!!!!! all to save a secret amount of money. I estimate the cost should be 16 million dollars. An in-kind contribution from your families like yours!!!!!

 -----

I'm trying to pinpoint the wording in the administrators guideline that is
being interpreted as Make the kids sit still and do nothing after they
finish their tests.  I can't find anything to that effect in the guidelines.
Can you point me to it?  All I can find is the directive to not let them
bring anything into the testing room.  Nowhere does it say that they can't
be given anything to do once they complete the test.

From Leonie:

Leaked absurd memo from Pearson defending the Pineapple story

Everyone should read this memo.  It is one of the most surreal things I have ever read., unbelievably, the Pineapple passage & questions have been used 27 times before, in 5 other states, and three large districts!

It just shows how the testing companies have been allowed to run rampant over our kids, with no accountability and no one looking over their shoulder.  Poor Alabama kids, who have been subjected to this passage 8 times since 2004; though you would think eventually they would catch on.

State administrations include:
• Alabama 2004-2011
• Arkansas 2008-2010
• Delaware 2005-2010
• Illinois 2006-2007
• New Mexico 2005-2007
• Florida 2006
Large District Administrations:
• Chicago 2006-2007
• Fort Worth
• Houston

Read more: http://ideas.time.com/2012/05/04/pineapplegate-exclusive-memo-detailing-the-hare-and-the-pineapple-passage/2/#ixzz1tvAmpMaL

And look at the author’s name: Jon S. Twing, Ph.D. Executive Vice President & Chief Measurement Officer, Pearson

Read more: http://ideas.time.com/2012/05/04/pineapplegate-exclusive-memo-detailing-the-hare-and-the-pineapple-passage/2/#ixzz1tvAaHQzF

A perfect object lesson in why psychometric pseudo

science (and justifying babble) should not replace real live human qualified and trained TEACHERS and teacher-generated assessments.

Why trust this flawed model with evaluating the teaching and learning of our kids, teachers, schools and districts?

 And why cut our school budgets to the bone so we can afford these outrageous for-profit vendors, when we (under) pay teachers and administrators to assess effective teaching and learning every day?

This is a sham,  a scam and all about the ADULTS, not the kids! 

Please Take the Tests & Publish Your Scores

May 4, 2012 //

6

We have a plethora of governors, legislators, and state commissioners of education who are gaga over standardized testing, They can’t imagine a child who is not taking a test today, tomorrow, and next week. They want to test everything: not only reading and math, but the arts, science, civics, history, foreign languages, physical education, you name it and they want to test it.

When the test-lovers see low scores, they want to find the teacher swho did it and fire them. They can’t see any reason for low scores other than those darn teachers. They want “great” teachers and they figure the way to get them is to keep teachers insecure and intimidated. That’s sure to attract the best and brightest!

When the test-lovers see low scores, they not only want to fire teachers, they want to close the schools where those kids are enrolled and hand them over to private managers. The private managers will kick out the kids with low scores and find some students who have a better shot at getting those better scores. That’s called progress. Nobody wants those kids with low scores. Send ‘em back to the public schools that haven’t been closed yet.

I have a modest proposal for the officials–elected and appointed–who are so test-happy.

They should take the tests and publish their scores. If they aren’t willing to take the tests and publish their scores, they should pipe down.

Just a thought.

Diane

The Pearson Scam: Tip of the Pineapple by Fred Smith

It looks like [Pearson] has worked out an amazing testing scheme — producing items along the way, paid for by one or another state, owned by Pearson, and then re-sold and re-sold to other states for developmental purposes or operational use.-- Fred Smith 

Fred who is on GEM's Change the Stakes committee sent in this piece published at the WAPO Answer Sheet blog.

Pearson and how 2012 standardized tests were designed

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/pearson-and-how-2012-standardized-tests-were-designed/2012/04/27/gIQAjQ0MkT_blog.html#pagebreak

 

By Valerie Strauss

This was written by Fred Smith, a retired New York City Board of Education senior analyst who worked for the public school system in test research and development.
 
By Fred Smith

The recent Pineapple and the Hare fiasco does more than identify a daft reading passage on New York State’s 8th grade English Language Arts test. Education Commissioner John King scrapped the selection and its six multiple-choice items, admitting they were “ambiguous,” when the questions became public last week. The episode opens the door to discussing how the 2012 exams were put together.

The State Education Department signed a five-year, $32 million agreement with NCS Pearson to develop English Language Arts and math assessments in grades three to eight. In fact, math testing was administered over three days this week for 1.2 million students.
Pearson has grown immensely over the last decade, securing contracts with many states required to test students under the No Child Left Behind Act. This year it succeeded CTB/McGraw-Hill as New York’s test vendor.

The ever-increasing and implausibly high percentages of students deemed proficient on CTB’s exams was a test bubble that finally burst in 2009, as sobering data from community colleges revealed that most entrants were inadequately prepared in reading and math. Albany admitted the cut off points defining proficiency had been set too low.

Blame for the incredible results was ascribed to “stand-alone” field testing, where items are tried out to see how samples of students perform on them and to identify which ones will appear on the real aka operational tests.

The success of this method depends on sampling students who are representative of the test population and who will take the no-stakes field tests seriously. CTB’s stand-alone field tests were given to students who had little motivation to do well on them. This led to miscalculations in constructing subsequent statewide exams.

To overcome the problem State Education Department officials sought vendors who would embed field test items — specifically, multiple-choice questions—inside the real exam. Pearson won the bid. Thus, last week’s English Language Arts test contained try-out items that won’t count in scoring the test and operational items that will.

The assumption behind this approach is that students will strive to do well on all items since they don’t know which ones actually count in evaluating them (and their teachers and schools). By design, about one-third of the multiple-choice items do not count. Performance on these items will be studied to decide which should go on 2013’s exams.

Where does the pineapple come in? Pearson’s contract also calls for the vendor to provide 20-25 nationally-normed multiple-choice questions per grade. This is to allow students to be compared with students from other states. The pineapple passage was part of this stipulation.
The material was drawn from Pearson’s item bank — material that had been seen in several other states handled by the vendor. That explains the buzz generated when it cropped up last week.

Students past and present who read The Pineapple and the Hare posted versions of this story and shared stunned reactions to it. Many wondered how, on its face, it could have survived field testing runs and passed the State Education Department’s own teacher review processes.

By contract, Pearson is bound to provide 120-150 nationally normed ELA and math items to New York — items that have been exposed elsewhere. It will make money re-using previously developed items and selling them to Albany. Afterward, the vendor can sell them to other states, having banked a wealth of data showing how over one million more kids fared on its questions.

Ironically, despite its shortcomings, the State Eduation Department and Pearson will revert to stand-alone field testing this June to try out other multiple-choice and open-ended questions for use on next spring’s exams.

Prediction: There will be many more revelations, and deja vu item experiences this year as the State Education Department/Pearson partnership launches. And because of the way the tests were hastily re-configured in December — reducing the number of multiple-choice items by 20 percent — expect errors within the items, mechanical mistakes (in test distribution and scoring) and technical foul-ups.

It looks like the vendor has worked out an amazing testing scheme — producing items along the way, paid for by one or another state, owned by Pearson, and then re-sold and re-sold to other states for developmental purposes or operational use.

Boycott Pearson and McGraw-Hill and Hold EVERYONE Accountable

UPDATED April 30, 2012

Pearson is not a direct member of ALEC. One has to dig a little deeper to see the insidious ties between Pearson, the largest provider of education related materials (read: textbooks, testing materials, test preparation materials, National Common Core materials and teacher training workshops.), and ALEC. Some of Pearson's associations with ALEC and/or parallel corporate-model approach to privatizing education at a profit... [Excerpt from call to boycott]

Perdido Street School calls for Pearson and the gang to be held accountable:
(Value-Added Measurement Of Pearson, NYSED And Regents Needed) for Pineapplegate and other errors. But Pearson's sins go way beyond that.

PLEASE DISTRIBUTE WIDELY and see full link at  http://unitedoptout.com/uncategorized/pearson-alec-and-the-brave-new-world-boycott-now/ <http://unitedoptout.com/uncategorized/pearson-alec-and-the-brave-new-world-boycott-now/>

Please go to www.unitedoptout.com <http://www.unitedoptout.com/>  to download our supporting documents. Also please sign your name to the "reply" box to show your support! Enough "signatures" can effect future policy.

(Note: We have revised our Boycott Pearson information for clarity and in order to add additional research - please use this version, posted April 29, 2012, when sharing.)

Supporters of Public Education,

The curtain has been pulled aside recently from the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), exposing the seedy underbelly of our democracy. Organizations like ALEC circumvent the democratic process in favor of corporations. Financial resources are used to influence public officials and provide model legislation meant to easily pass through state houses of governance. Recent examples include infamous "Stand Your Ground" laws and others that seek to limit the voting rights of marginalized populations. Education reform legislation is also part of ALEC's agenda, with substantial sponsorship from corporate funds to divert the flow of valuable taxpayer dollars away from public schools.

ALEC-inspired advocacy for public education reform typically follows a path to privatization; that is, viewing educational practices vis-à-vis economic and capitalist principles. Strict school choice models, vouchers, private charter management organizations, and the erosion of collective bargaining rights are all examples of the economic management of public education. As opposed to a valuable public good, certain entities prevalent in the education reform debate are forcing schools to motivate themselves by profit and competition. What it means to be an educated person (e.g., college and career ready), what is important to teach (e.g., common standards), and how success is measured (e.g., standardized tests) are currently under significant transformation without the thorough vetting via democratic processes. And with the frustration and confusion ensuing from rapid developments occurring behind closed doors, outside the public spotlight of democracy, there are large corporations conveniently present to sell us products that will solve all of our problems.

Pearson is one such entity that as of late always seems to be at the right place and precisely at the right time. In other words, just as new legislation is passed, as new educational mandates are set, Pearson is suddenly able to provide the legions of educators and school systems clamoring for some kind of answer with just the right product. How can this be? In recent years, this once relatively small publishing house turned itself into a massive provider of a range of educational products, from traditional print materials for the K-12 sector, higher education resources and technology solutions for public school systems. It is one thing to have various products to sell and to allow the marketplace to judge their success or failure. It is another matter to reorganize the rules so that Pearson products are all one needs to buy to satisfy a range of emerging Federal and State education mandates.

For better or for worse, education reform in the United States is largely controlled by legislation. It appears then that Pearson is successfully implementing a two-pronged approach: grease the democratic process in their favor so that certain rules must be followed and from the other side perfectly match their own products so they have exactly what can be bought to satisfy those requirements. Pearson, through connections to ALEC, has become the dominant provider of education resources and services in the K-12 and post-secondary markets. The following are some of the affiliations that made this perfect alignment possible:

* Pearson acquired the Connections Academy, whose co-founder and executive VP is Mickey Revenaugh, also the co-chair of the ALEC Education Task Force. Both Connections and the for-profit University of Phoenix have been or are currently subsidiaries of the Apollo Management Group. The CEO of AMG, Charles (Chaz) Edelstein, was Managing Director of Credit Suisse and Head of the Global Services group within the Investment Banking division, based in Chicago. He is also on the Board of Directors for Teach for America, which is a provider of temporary and inexperienced teachers and also frequently associated with corporate education reform. One prominent name in this regard is TFA alum Michelle Rhee, the failed former Chancellor of DC public schools.

* According to Pearson's website: "Pearson Education and the University of Phoenix, the largest private (for-profit) university in the United States announced a partnership which will accelerate the University's move to convert its course materials to electronic delivery." [emphasis added]. As such, Pearson will certainly provide the materials and the mode of transmission. It must also be stated here that many for-profit universities have been under investigation for student loan fraud and unethical recruitment practices.

* America's Choice was also recently acquired by Pearson. This organization is directly associated with the Lumina, Broad, and Walton Foundations, all active members of ALEC. They each promote so-called "innovations" that appeal to the corporate and for-profit mindset.

* Bryan Cave, LLP is the lobbying firm for Pearson. Edward Koch is currently one of the partners at Bryan Cave. Edward Koch sits conveniently and comfortably on the board for StudentsFirst NY, a branch of the national initiative StudentsFirst, which is the brainchild of failed former Chancellor of DC public schools Michelle Rhee. It must also be stated that Rhee's tenure is under a dark cloud of investigation for rampant test cheating and tampering in the district.

* Pearson is contracted with Stanford University to deliver the Teacher Performance Assessment (TPA) to more than 25 participating states. According to Pearson's website, "TPA is led by Stanford University, American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, and Pearson." Furthermore, "Pearson's electronic portfolio management system will support candidates, institutions of higher education, and state educational agencies by providing registration and account management services, submission of the portfolio for scoring and results reporting." [emphasis added]. Pearson provides the administrative management skills and broad-based technology and delivery systems that will support the Teacher Performance Assessment (TPA) and bring it to a national scale. Stanford University's Office of Technology Licensing (OTL) selected Pearson to provide these needed services for the TPA. Let it be known that the U.S. Dept. of Ed. is currently considering teacher preparation programs to be evaluated based on accountability measures similar to public schools.

* Sir Michael Barber is the current Chief Education Advisor for Pearson. It is no secret that Mr. Barber is a powerful advocate for the free-market approach to education, including union busting, merit pay, and turning public schools into privately run charters.

* Pearson contracts with Achieve to manage the PARCC assessments. Achieve is funded by Lumina, State Farm (both members of ALEC) and The Alliance for Excellence in Education (AEE). AEE chairman Bob Wise is a regular contributor to and participant with the ALEC educational agenda. Moreover, PARCC awarded Pearson a contract in January to develop a new Technology Readiness Tool, which will support state education agencies to evaluate and determine needed technology and infrastructure upgrades for the new online assessments. Pray tell, who will sell those upgrades?

* The Tucker Capital Corporation acted as exclusive advisor to The American Council on Education (ACE) and Pearson on the creation of a groundbreaking new business that will drive the future direction, design, and delivery of the GED testing program.

* The Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) partners with a whole cast of other organizations that promote a corporate, anti-public education reform agenda. CCSSO Central "partners" include (among others) McGraw-Hill and Pearson. CCSSO Director Tom Luna works closely with Jeb Bush, whose associations with ALEC and corporate-reform are too numerous to mention.

* GradNation is a special project of America's Promise Alliance, sponsored by Alma and Gen. Colin Powell. Grad Nation sponsors include State Farm (ALEC), the Walton Foundation (ALEC), AT&T (on the corporate board of ALEC), The Boeing Company (ALEC), the Pearson Foundation and Philip Morris USA (ALEC). The GradNation Summit list of presenters reads like an ALEC yearbook.

* Gen. Colin Powell sits on the Board of Directors for The Council for Foreign Relations, which issued an "Education Reform and National Security" report (co-chaired by Joel Klein and Condoleeza Rice, directed by Julia Levy). The report states, among other things, that: "The Task Force believes that though revamping expectations for students should be a state-led effort, a broader coalition . including the defense community, businesses leaders, the U.S. Department of Education, and others . also has a meaningful role to play in monitoring and supporting implementation and creating incentives to motivate states to adopt high expectations. The Defense Policy Board, which advises the secretary of defense, and other leaders from the public and private sectors should evaluate the learning standards of education in America and periodically assess whether what and how students are learning is sufficiently rigorous to protect the country's national security interests." [emphasis added].

* According to Susan Ohanian: "In the introduction to the Education Reform and National Security report, Julia Levy, Project Director, thanks 'the several people who met with and briefed the Task Force group including the U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, Mary Cullinane formerly of Microsoft [Philadelphia School of the Future] [now Vice President of Corporate and Social Responsibility for Houghton Mifflin Harcourt], Sir Michael Barber of Pearson and David Coleman of Student Achievement Partners .' They were briefed by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, and Pearson."

* Pearson has partnered with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to create a series of digital instructional resources. In November 2011, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation gave ALEC $376,635 to educate and engage its membership on more efficient state budget approaches to drive greater student outcomes, as well as educate them on beneficial ways to recruit, retain, evaluate and compensate effective teaching based upon merit and achievement (the Gates Foundation recently withdrew its support for ALEC under the heat of public pressure). However, their billions of dollars still flow to other far-reaching organizations dedicated to dismantling public education.

* The National Board of Professional Teaching Standards is a private-sector member of ALEC. Bob Wise (Chairman, of NBPTS) and Alliance for Excellent Education presented on "National Board's Fund Initiative to Grow Great Schools" at the Education Task Force Meeting at the 2011 ALEC annual picnic. According to the NBPTS website, they "announced that it has awarded Pearson a five-year contract for the period 2009-2013 to develop, administer and score its National Board Certification program for accomplished teachers. Pearson will collaborate with NBPTS to manage its advanced teacher certification program in 25 certificate areas that span 16 subject areas."

* Pearson has also acquired partnerships with companies to deliver PARCC, SAT testing, GED testing, and was the central player (through Achieve) in the design of the National Common Core Standards. The GED Testing Service, while wholly owned by the American Council for Education, entered into a joint venture with Pearson to transform the GED for some 40 million adult Americans (one in five adults) lacking a high school diploma. This is an entirely new market.

Even with all of Pearson's efforts, they are not the only game in town. McGraw-Hill is another publisher forging similar connections and making money hand over fist due to NCLB-mandated reading programs like Open Court and SRA Reading Mastery. Of course, after billions spent on Reading First and the McGraw-Hill materials, the federally funded evaluation of the program showed no increase in reading comprehension by third grade. McGraw-Hill is also one of the biggest test publishers in the U.S. and publishes the CTBS, the central competitor to Pearson's illustrious SAT-10.

The legislation forced upon states to adopt the curriculum (i.e., the Common Core) and its required testing measures (i.e., PARCC) essentially eliminates the possibility of consumer choice (supposedly a key concept in free market ideology) and requires that taxpayer dollars for education be handed over to Pearson and McGraw-Hill as the sole providers of nearly all educational resources available to the schools. It is frightening that Pearson, profiting billions from public education, is simultaneously operated by and sponsors organizations that promote the destruction of public education. It is essentially forcing the public to pay for the demise of its own education system.

It is possible that Pearson and its allies will deny and attempt to refute the information bulleted above. Perhaps the magnitude of their efforts will project the magnitude of their guilt. Whatever the semantics here, if a connection is really an association, if ownership is actually sponsorship, or if partnership actually means membership, it is interesting and coincidental that the above cast of characters constantly find themselves associated with each other. Additionally, the common friend to all seems to be Pearson.

If Pearson is truly interested in profit, as all corporations typically are, then consumer pressure is the best way to be heard. We at United Opt Out National are calling on everyone to take a stand against Pearson by doing any or all of the following:

* Refuse to buy their materials or adopt them in your courses or for personal use.
* Bring these concerns to local PTAs, school boards and libraries.
* If required to use Pearson products due to professional obligations, do so under public protest.
* Promote the use of ACT rather than SAT, as SAT is a Pearson product.
* Inform Pearson of your actions.
* If you are in higher education, discuss your concerns with your local Pearson representative, informing them that for these purposes you are not going to adopt their materials in any of your courses.

Raise public awareness so the brakes can be put on this madness. Please see our sample letter at the end of this research document, which you are encouraged to share so that others may refuse Pearson products.
Sincerely,
United Opt Out National

Morna McDermott McNulty
Associate Professor
College of Education
Towson University

"All power to the imagination!"
 

PS 261 UNITE Sponsors Forum Weds on HST, Brian Jones/Lisa Donlan comments on Literature vs. Standardized Tests and Pearson Eats GED

With all the debate on testing, where is the UFT?

I'm packing a lot into this post. Sorry I'm going to miss this forum.

April, 2012

PS 261 is loaded with activists like Brian Jones, Jamie Fidler and Melissa Torres. And they rave about the principal Zipporah Mills. You know it's funny how many principals are turning up that people enjoy working for. But then again there is this MUST READ Assailed Teacher post:  A Tale of Two School Districts.

 
*PS261 UNITE is an independent group of teachers, parents, and community members advocating for our students, our community, and the right to free, quality public education.

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Brian Jones makes a great point about how good lit cannot really be tested effectively on a high stakes test.

I think it's [the pineapple story] a quirky story -- but really no stranger or mysterious than many other classic stories for children. This occurred to me as I was reading Harold and the Purple Crayon to my daughter this morning!

The problem is that when a story has any element that is not perfectly clear (which, in my view, makes it actually a more interesting story) then it's hardly fair to test kids on it and demand that there be a single right answer to questions about its meaning.

On the other hand, if you serve up a story that DOES have a bunch of "right" answers that are clear and straightforward, then you're not really dealing with literature that anyone would really cherish, savor, enjoy, etc. The delicious thought process that *can* occur between reader and text is lost, and is turned into a "skill" exercise.

Hence the problem with testing is even deeper -- it's a reductive approach to literacy that tries to take something inherently complex and make it simple. In doing so, most of what makes good literature and real reading worthwhile is lost. 

That's why the Pinneapple and the Hare may actually be a great (or just, funny) story, and thus HORRIBLE as a test passage.

Brian Jones

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The issue is the use (misuse) of the passage in the context of the test. Not a commentary on the text as a text/story/piece of literature or in any way a left handed defense of the "good" test questions that are not ambiguous.

I included some comments from students on the absurdity of testing.

These tests are so stupid. they do not test any knowledge. they will never count for anything. no one, in lets say, 20 years, is going to ask you how you did on your 7th or 8th grade standardized tests. no one! and that is why the amount of pressure that students are put under to do well on these tests is so silly and horrible! in the end, this will never count! for anything! it won't matter!

The point of school is to learn, and not to spend half the year on prepping for a silly state test that will not be of any use in the future. 

I don't even think kids that are trying to get into good colleges go through this amount of stress. AND IT MOST DEFINITELY SHOULD NOT BE THIS WAY!!! 

Lisa Donlan

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There is a GREAT NY times piece about just what Brian was talking about--written by a teacher. Check it out:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/22/opinion/sunday/taking-emotions-out-of-our-schools.html?_r=1&emc=eta1

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From Mike Klonsky:
Daniel Pinkwater

"Who knew my book would be used for world’s dumbest test question?" -- Daily News

Deborah Meier

"In the world of testing, it does not really matter whether an answer is right or wrong; the 'right' answer is the one that field testing has shown to be the consensus answer of the 'smart' kids. It’s a psychometric concept.” -- When Pineapple Races Hare, Students Lose

Valerie Strauss

"The whole push for test-based school reform makes about as much sense as a talking pineapple." -- The Answer Sheet

ETS spokesman Tom Ewing

“We don’t want students to come out of a test and perhaps memorize questions or share or discuss questions with students who may not have tested yet,” said Tom Ewing, spokesman for ETS, which administers the SAT for the College Board. -- Miami Herald

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Leonie Haimson on Pearson takeover of GED

Pearson just acquired the contract to take over developing and giving the GED exams across the entire nation, to be taken on computer and supposedly aligned with the Common Core; it is also  “planning a substantial cost increase” that will double the cost of the exam which  may force states to restrict the no. of students that are able to them.  See article in Albany paper below.

Last year, the American Council on Education, which is providing the test through next year, and Pearson Vue Testing, a for-profit company, announced they would create a new, more rigorous GED, which would be administered and provided by a new company, GED Testing Service LLC. The new computer-based test is to be aligned with national common core standards and would replace the current exam in January 2014.

See also press release below, which says Pearson will be selling “associated online courses to help prepare students for GED” – another huge source of potential profit and adds:  

The new GED Testing Service will build on its past experience in adult and continuing education by harnessing the considerable resources of Pearson, the world's largest education and testing company, with the nearly 70-year history of ACE to expand access to the GED Test, ensure its quality and integrity…”

Given  #pineapplegate that may  be a hard line to sell.

State may bypass GED

Costs, less control over school equivalency exam have state eyeing change