E-School News – Michael J. Petrilli
“Way back in 2007, we at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute published a landmark study with experts from the Northwest Evaluation Association: The Proficiency Illusion. It found that state definitions for reading and math “proficiency” were all over the map—and shockingly subpar almost everywhere. In Wisconsin, for instance, eighth graders could be reading at the fourteenth percentile nationally and still be considered proficient. This was a big problem—not just the inconsistency, though that surely made it harder to compare schools across state lines. Mostly, we worried about the signals that low proficiency standards sent to parents: the false positives indicating that their kids were on track for success when they actually weren’t. How were parents in Madison or Duluth supposed to know that their “proficient” son was really far below grade level, not to mention way off track for success in college and career? That was one of the main reasons we started pushing for national standards and tests (what would eventually become the Common Core). We wanted parents to know the truth about how their children were faring in school—and wanted educators to aim for higher expectations in their teaching. After years of lackluster progress with state-by-state standards, we thought an interstate approach might work better.”(more)