For the students hoping to graduate from a Washington State high school in 2008, a standardized test called the “Washington Assessment of Student Learning� test (aka WASL) will be administered and they will have to pass in order to get their diplomas.
The testing for graduation starts in the tenth grade, which is perfect because it asks questions at a tenth grade level. For those who do not pass the first time around, the test is re-administered at least twice a year until the end of their twelfth grade year, giving each student at least six opportunities to pass.
In 1991, it was determined that students in the state public school system were being failed by the system, so then Democrat Governor Booth Gardner created the ‘Governor’s Council on Education Reform and Funding’ and they decided that the system needed a way of evaluating student progress and this is what they came up with by the end of the legislative session in 1993.
Yes, you read that correctly; it took them over a year and a half to figure out that they needed to test student knowledge and then another 12 years to implement it.
And now the former Governor who started the ball rolling has come out of retirement to say that it won’t work. (Article is in the archives. To access it sign in as ‘AK1’ with a password of ‘cowbell’)
His basic contention is that since there are students with varying cultures, their knowledge will be different and all this standardizing will alienate all the non-white students.
I don’t know if he actually means that Black, Asian, Hispanic and Indian kids are stupid, but that is what I’m taking that he believes.
Since each student is different, Gardner says that we now need a different way for each student to show their knowledge.
Last year, 42.8% of students passed the WASL, Gardner thinks that this proves that the test is racist because these results showed a gap “between white, affluent students and students from low-income and minority families�. He also says that of the 25 states that created tests that needed to be passed in order to graduate, 17 of them have added “alternative performance measures or options� and that of the eight who haven’t “5 have experienced declining success�.
To Gardner, it is proof that these tests don’t work.
But I think it shows more of how the schools themselves aren’t working.
If you tell students, ‘This is what you will need to learn to graduate’ and they don’t learn it, or worse, the teachers don’t teach it, is it really the test’s fault?
No.
The kids need to know how to communicate via the written word and to be able to complete basic mathematical functions beyond addition and subtraction. Reading, Writing and Arithmentic were the subjects and standards for decades and centuries in the western world, which is where these students will, more than likely, be living. They will need these skills to be able to survive in the world, yet people like Gardner thinks that if a student cannot pass a test of these subjects based at a tenth grade level, the student showing that they know something else in an alternative form of test is going to serve the student well.
Maybe some sort of ‘Talent Show Graduation Board’ where the kids can do interpretive dance or rap and be allowed to graduate.
I call bullshit.
Gardner sees his legacy going down the drain since too many teachers seen to want to teach that ‘even if you lose, you’re still a winner’ because that makes the students feel better about themselves and they absorb that quicker than geometry (one of my worst subjects, BTW).
The school system is failing and the person who set out to stop it is seeing that all he did was create a new method of proving how bad it is failing. And like a good Democrat, he immediately whips out the race card to try and put the brakes on it.
He holds no hope that extra schooling and practice testing will help failing students, he just wants the test to go away as a determining factor. Who cares if the students aren’t learning because the teachers aren’t teaching or aren’t allowed to teach, let’s just hand out those esteem building pieces of paper and bitch about the fact that Johnny has to work for minimum wage because he can’t read.
At least he’ll feel good about himself, for a while anyway.
AND, he’ll vote Democrat when we offer to raise the minimum wage!
For those who read yesterday’s post on Barely Governor Gregoire’s plan on spending the state’s surplus budget, you probably saw that she plans on giving out $39 Million for “Additional K-12 spending to help students who fail all or part of the WASL standardized test�.
If Gardner has his way, it’ll all be a waste. Johnny will be allowed to graduate because he can draw horses.
You may also remember that she plans on spending $2 Million on a “Department of Early Learning�.
Let’s see, it took fourteen years to get the WASL up and running, and it is just a testing procedure. I guess I’ll be seeing the DEL in early 2030 then!