The 21st Century Principal

A headline on this morning's News and Observer Website read: "NC Schools Deal with Fewer Dollars for Textbooks."  According to the article, textbook funding has been cut by 80 percent or more over the past four years. This cut, coupled with cuts in instructional supply money, teaching assistant cuts, among a whole laundry list of cuts makes it very clear that North Carolina public education is not a funding priority for our state legislature or governor. 

What is even more amazing is how our state is able to afford the largest increase in the number of state tests administered in state history, yet instructional materials and textbooks have been increasingly cut each year. What's wrong with this picture? Here's some points for thought.

• The expectation in our state is that teachers will provide ever increasing levels of high quality instruction while doing so with less and less instructional tools for the classroom.
• In the midst of it all, our state still manages to find funding to administer over 40 (the number depends on which tests you count and whose taking them) tests to all students during the course of the year. Now I realize the argument the testing and accountability supporters will make here is that "Testing is cost effective and that it just doesn't cost that much to give tests." Perhaps that's true, but if our state politicians and state level education bureaucrats were all that serious about providing a quality education for the students of North Carolina, then you would see the same level of commitment to provide adequate funding for textbooks, technology, and instructional materials for the classrooms. Why can't they muster the same enthusiasm and commitment for providing texts and classroom materials that they have for testing?
• It is cheaper to test, test, test than it is to fund classrooms. That's the reality. The state can easily churn out a new test or contract with College Board to give one more test, but to provide adequate texts,technology and instructional materials for the classroom is costly. But the logic behind this fails me. If you really want to impact classroom instruction, then put the money where it will do the most  good: the classroom, not additional tests and the testing bureaucracy that goes along with them. The most recent survey done by Marketplace Morning Report found that 99.5 percent of teachers paid an average of $485 to stock their classrooms the previous year.
• No teacher should ever have to spend their own personal money so that they can carry out instruction in their classrooms. Teachers are really dedicated people who work very hard for the most part. Many, many teachers spend their own money on school supplies for their classrooms just to be able to provide their students with engaging and meaningful learning. Yet, our state seems to always find funding to add a new test or develop some kind of new data program. Perhaps it's time to fund what really counts: classroom instruction.

“While it has been many years since I was in high school, there is a tradition that has continued since I was a student at Staunton River High---tests are given at the end of each course.” June Atkinson, Superintendent, North Carolina Public Schools

In a recent blog post entitled “How Many Tests Do North Carolina Students Have to Take?” North Carolina State Superintendent Dr. June Atkinson justifies North Carolina’s massive increase in the number of high stakes tests by pointing back to her own days in high school. Her reasoning is that “It is a tradition to take tests at the end of the course” so what’s the big fuss about all these tests North Carolina is asking students to take?

Here’s what she does not mention in her post that was not in existence when she was in high school.

• Tests did not determine by policy whether students failed courses or grade levels. In Dr. Atkinson’s day, there was an understanding and common sense that all students do not have the same abilities and skills so their effectiveness could not be judged by a single test score. Teachers in Dr. Atkinson’s high school did not have to condemn students to “not being proficient” by a single test score. Instead, they were able to make holistic decisions about student performance that was based on teacher knowledge of that student.
• Tests scores were not used to judged the effectiveness of teachers and administrators because educators understood that was not what the tests were designed to do. The tests designed by Dr. Atkinson’s teachers were designed to see if students learned what that teacher taught, not judge teacher performance. And, teacher tests were designed by the teacher who taught the students not by teachers in the far-off state capital who have never met the students being tested. Fundamentally, Dr. Atkinson’s teachers tested what they taught and what they thought students should know. Not today, North Carolina teachers are forced teach what 800 teachers who met in Raleigh decided should be on the test.
• While students may only spend 10 hours testing, though I question this number, teachers are forced to spend days in test-prep mode, after all these tests are used to determine their effectiveness. Teachers in Dr. Atkinson’s day prepared students for life, not the next test because their job performance was not judged by an exam score. They judged their success as a teacher by how well their students did in life. The reality of testing that state leaders and politicians ignore is that what’s on the test is what gets taught, period, hence, that’s why North Carolina schools have become massive test-prep centers.

Dr. Atkinson’s post seeks to justify North Carolina's massive increase in the number of tests using that age-old argument, “It’s a tradition.” But her arguments ignore much of what was not tradition. Her argument that North Carolina teachers “now have access to standard, quality exams that they do not have to develop on their own” doesn't make these new high stakes exams more palatable either. There "quality" is yet to be determined. In the end, what has changed about Education in North Carolina? Nothing that’s good if you look at our state testing program.

"Who would want to teach in a system that measures your worth as an educator by how much your students can regurgitate on a two-hour multiple-choice test and that has reduced much of the curriculum to tedious test-prep exercises?" writes Tony Wagner in his latest book entitled Creating Innovators: The Making of Young People Who Will Change the World.

Who, indeed, would want to teach in the kind of education system Wagner describes in this question? Perhaps a better question would be, "Who would want to learn in such a system?" Yet, with all the increased emphasis across the country on test scores as part of both teacher and principal evaluations, the kind of education system Wagner predicts is already coming to fruition, and my state is on the fast track to such a system.

North Carolina schools have had a "Learning Culture" characterized as "getting students ready for THE TEST" since it began rolling out state tests in the 1990s. Now, North Carolina has moved from using those same tests to determine student proficiency to determine teacher and principal proficiency. And, for subjects that do not currently have a standardized test, they are creating a TEST, to not measure student learning, but to measure educator proficiency. The end result  of these measures will obviously be that the state that once proclaimed proudly "First in Flight" on its license plates, can soon declare "First in Test-Prep." 

Sadly, though, one can but wonder if all this emphasis on test scores is going to totally destroy or keep us from developing very kind of "Learning Culture" that we should be fostering for 21st century learners. That culture should emphasize, collaboration, multidisciplinary learning, thoughtful risk taking, trial and error, creating, and intrinsic motivational learning. Test-Prep learning cultures are an anathema to each of these.

In my experience, schools and districts with "Test-Prep Learning Cultures" are characterized by some of the following:

• Student learning is reduced to what can be fit within the confines of A, B, C, and D on a bubble sheet. There is no time for independent exploration and learning. Students spend their days taking endless quizzes and tests in multiple choice format. Projects? Forget it! They take away valuable time better spent getting students to bubble-in right answers.
• Teaching is reduced to "only the essentials found on THE TEST." Nothing else matters. No room for student curiosity. Teachers spend inordinate amounts of time analyzing tests and test items and build learning around what they find.
• Teaching is about "covering the curriculum" not about whether students actually get it or find it relevant. Teachers end up repeating to students many times, "You need to learn this because it will probably "be on the test" not because it will help you be a better 21st century citizen or even help you get a job one day.
• Signs and posters on the walls remind everyone "Days to Test Day" as if on that day, the most important event of our students' lives is going happen. What a let-down, to have the most important event of the year be one, big "Bubblesheet Fest" at the end of the year. Also, one can only imagine the pressure these kinds of things add to kids on test day. These posters and signs are a clear indicator of what Test-Prep Learning Culture Schools value the most.
• Students and teachers participate in "Test-Prep Pep Rallies" or other similar events to fire them up to take THE TEST. In "Test-Prep Learning Culture Schools" principals and teachers will go to great lengths to motivate students to get engaged in THE TEST. These kinds of events also communicate the message to students who do not score well on THE TEST that they are somehow unworthy. 
• Students are judged in every way by their TEST SCORES. The are classified as smart and proficient based on their last End of Course Test or End of Grade Test. Students who are creative and talented in the areas of art and music and not test-takers are at worst de-valued. At the least, they have no way to engage these interests.
• Subjects are separated into silos, each with its own test. There's no time for multidisciplinary learning. There is only time to teach the content that is on THE TEST. The superficial boundaries between knowledge areas are reinforced in a Test-Prep Learning Culture.
• Getting the right answer is more important than anything else. There is no room for experimentation, and the only thing you learn from a wrong answer is that "you were wrong, period." Questions that do not have only one right answer are irrelevant or ignored. Failure is not a learning experience; it is to be avoided at all costs.

Diane Ravitch recently was interviewed by Dan Rather on HDNet. During that interview, she emphasized several things the public needs to know about the current state of public schools.

• "No Child Left Behind has set our public schools on the road to destruction." I have often wondered if the true motivation behind that legislation was to simply make sure schools fail so that arguments for privatization would be stronger. Perhaps that's not the true intent of the law, but it has been the result.
• No Child Left Behind, with its tremendous emphasis on testing, has not succeeded in teaching anybody anything. It has turned schools into test-prep centers, where the only thing that matters is the scores. The scores even matter more than the students.
• Tests should not be used to make high stakes decisions. Our politicians around the country are doing just that. Florida is basing whether a student is promoted on "the test." Many more states have adopted merit pay schemes and tenure schemes that are tied to testing. It would seem that politicians have more faith in these tests than the ones who give them every year.

Check out Diane Ravitch's interview below.




No Child Left Behind has been a disaster. Those of us who have worked in schools that received the infamous label of "AYP-Not Met" know first hand how all focus turns to "the test." Students are asked to give up electives such as art or music so they can attend "one more tutoring session." It really is sad that we do that  to our kids.