Earlier this month I posted a letter written to Senator Patty Murray by Robey Clark, a fellow member of Oregon Save Our Schools, regarding reauthorization of ESEA. Today I am posting a letter he shared with me that was sent to Washington State Superintendent of Public Instruction Randy Dorn by the governing tribes of the Washington State Tribal Compact Schools on June 5th, 2015. Mr. Dorn has yet to respond to the tribes. 

The sentiment in this letter can be broadly applied not only to Native students but to all students.  Our public schools are diverse. Students deserve to have their cultures recognized and respected. They deserve lessons that engage and speak to them, and they deserve to be evaluated in an authentic way. We must bring the humanity back to our schools. 

Big thanks to Robey Clark for sharing this with me and for fighting for the schools our children deserve. 


WASHINGTON TRIBAL COMPACT SCHOOL POSITION STATEMENT:

We, the governing tribes of the Washington State Tribal compact schools, hope to break the chronic cycle of failure among schools serving American Indian reservations. We intend to capitalize upon the opportunity presented by this new Tribal Compact School law by promoting the adoption of teaching practices which we believe to be more congruent with tribal cultures. In support of this effort, we intend to foster some important reforms in educational accountability methods that will encourage and reward a change in practice.

In recent decades, state and federal educational policy has focused on raising test scores for poor and minority students up to the general population average by the third grade (or soon after) in an effort to minimize the dropout rate. This policy has been a particular disaster for most public schools serving Indian reservations. The result has been a system that labels Indian children early; subjects them to continued remedial instruction; and fails to keep them engaged after the 4th grade. The over-emphasis on early grade test scores has evolved into a self-fulfilling (and self-perpetuating) prophecy of failure for Indian students. We believe it is this labeling effect, coupled with limited instructional methods that cause many if not most dropouts.

The Iroquois Sachem Canasatego once said to the English colonists of his time, “...you who are so wise must know that different Nations have different Conceptions of things and you will, therefore, not take it amiss if our Ideas of this kind of Education happen not to be the same as yours. We have had some Experience of it...”.

Our experience has been that our schools have diligently tried to adopt “research based” models and “data based decision making” as primary methods for school improvement for years now. For the past 15 years, federal policy has placed more and higher stakes on test results. So much weight has been placed upon them that, standardized tests have become an end unto themselves. Something must change. We do not accept that standardized testing defines the potential or truly measures the growth of our children in any meaningful way. Therefore, as sovereign tribal governments, shouldering the new responsibilities under the state compact, we feel it is our duty to make a change toward authentic assessment and accountability. If Indian students are motivated, they will succeed. It is our goal to create places where our children and young adults wish to be and where there is an inherent expectation and tradition of success.

In recent years, the state has commissioned and adopted assessments, such as the High School Proficiency Test (HSPE) and End of Course (EOC) exams, which have only served to make the student disengagement and dropout problem worse. Now, with the coming adoption of the Smarter Balanced Assessments (SBA) testing will take a quantum leap toward becoming much longer, more difficult, and demanding even greater attention. We believe that we cannot test our way to success. We have walked far enough down this path and are determined to change direction. Therefore, we are proposing a five-year moratorium from standardized testing in Tribal compact schools. During this time, we propose to develop a new evaluation paradigm based on applied learning and public demonstration. During this development period, we will use formative tests and/or other tools chosen by our staff to monitor progress and assist in teaching. We will develop a viable alternative evaluation system equaling or surpassing the rigor of state adopted testing. In addition, we will demonstrate American Indian student attendance and graduation rates that match or exceed state averages. Although intended for reservation-based districts, we hope such a system might be used by any district experiencing this chronic syndrome of failure.

We will call upon our schools to develop ways to teach content and to hone student academic skills through authentic work for real life purposes rather than to depend mainly upon passive and abstract classroom instruction. These methods may further enhance Indian student learning as they more closely resemble historical tribal teaching practices. Traditionally, our children learned specific skills within the context of an immediate and worthwhile task. As students progress toward later grades, authentic instruction should increase and passive classroom instruction decrease. To support these proposed reforms, we intend to provide our schools an evaluation model based upon public demonstration to the community. We will give our professional educational staff the flexibility to re-organize as necessary and to experiment in developing more deeply engaging educational experiences. In addition, we will find new ways to evaluate and award credit for the work completed outside the classroom. The teachers will work in teams to share the burden and include high school students in yearly planning.

We will require our schools to initiate formal public demonstrations of student work that meet the highest level of state standards, so that the tribe and community may appreciate the quality and value of the school. The demonstrations may include but are not limited to: individual or group projects in science and applied math; performance in music and dance; displays of art and literary work; student enterprises and worthy deeds for the school, tribe or community. The demonstrations will be challenging enough to show high skills and/or thorough understanding by students. Such demonstrations will also serve to help WOSPI to evaluate student accomplishments in terms of the state standards. We anticipate that the institution of such events will not only serve as a new method to evaluate student work but will also help rally our communities to support their schools.

To us, making sure all students graduate “on time” is not as important as making sure that all do indeed graduate as mature capable individuals with knowledge and skills to go forth in their chosen path. Our students will receive a diploma when each is ready to present herself or himself before the community with a portfolio that shows she or he is ready for college, skilled career training or the everyday work world. By the same token, this also means a student may graduate early by petition if they demonstrate extraordinary ability or talent and can meet the standards. As the vision stated in: From Where the Sun Rises: Addressing the Educational Achievement of Native Americans in Washington State--Delivered to the Washington Legislature, December 30, 2008--"Indian education dates back to a time when all children were identified as gifted and talented. Each child had a skill and ability that would contribute to the health and vitality of the community. Everyone in the community helped to identify and cultivate these skills and abilities. The elders were entrusted to oversee this sacred act of knowledge being shared. That is our vision for Indian education today."


*This blog post is dedicated to Ada May Smith McCormack, my beloved sister-friend who I know would be fighting with me if she still walked in this world. 

As you may know, ESEA reauthorization (aka No Child Left Behind possibly to be renamed Every Child Achieves) is being debated in the US Senate. Today I am posting a letter from Robey Clark to Senator Patty Murray of Washington state. Murray is Ranking Member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee. Mr. Clark is two years retired from the NW Regional Comprehensive Center. The NWRCC is one of a group of Comprehensive Assistance Centers which are federally funded to provide both consultations with state leaders and workshops for local teachers and administrators on planning, issue resolution, and best practices for Title 1 schools serving Native American children in the Northwest. Mr. Clark’s expertise in the area of education and programs is further explained in the first paragraph of his letter to Ms. Murray. Big thanks to Robey Clark for allowing me to publish his letter on my blog! 




To Sarah Bolton, Education Policy Director
Senate HELP Committee
Ranking Member Patty Murray




Sarah:  
Thank you for taking the time to read this.  I hope to speak to you again sometime soon.  For the record, I am two years retired after serving 15 years in the NW Regional Comprehensive Center starting in 1994.  Before that I administered the Title VII Indian Education Project in Portland for 15 years.  Before that, I worked for 5 years at the old NW Regional Educational Laboratory (NWREL)  where I where I spent the first year in training as an intern for educational evaluation. For the remaining four years worked on various lab contracts for educational evaluation, research and test development.  I am also a Blackfeet tribal member raised and schooled on the reservation. I graduated from high school in Browning, Montana in 1964.  My recommendations to Senator Murray are:

Drop support for the SBA (Smarter Balanced Assessment).  Spending millions on better tests is a bad investment.  The law of diminishing returns has long applied in test development.  My five years of work in evaluation and measurement left me with the conviction that growth in human learning cannot be measured in terms of comparative numbers.  The whole field of psychometrics rests on a wobbly set of theories balanced atop some questionable assumptions.  Yet, there has evolved a multimillion dollar educational testing and research infrastructure at work across the nation studying a problem they may have created in the first place when they first duped the public into believing that their paper and pencil tests were “instruments” capable of actually measuring growth in human learning and that the numbers produced by the tests were worthy of deep statistical analysis. Educational research, based on test scores, has grown like a cancer on the public school system with one dubious theory after another creeping into policy and distorting practice in schools.

Money has corrupted the psychometric discipline to the point that it has often devolved into sophistry.  Indeed, the CCSS/SBA  (Common Core State Standards/Smarter Balanced Assessment) initiative is not a legitimate school reform effort but rather a corporate sponsored business plan to feed at the federal trough at the expense of the public school system.  If Senator Murray looks closely, I think she will find that the SBA has been oversold and that the level of precision they promised is nowhere close to that which was inferred when they made the sales pitch.  (Is dropping students into one of four categories the high degree of precision they promised?) Nor is the information for parents and teachers any better. (There may be more of it but it is much like reading blurbs in a horoscope). Lastly, but perhaps more importantly, the time required to prepare for and to take the SBA, is so great that there is little time for anything else (including the very innovations that the CCSS hoped to inspire).

Federal test requirements should be as cheap and as unobtrusive as possible.You mentioned that Senator Murray is supporting the SBA in part because of strong pressure from civil rights and minority groups to strengthen accountability for public schools.  I sympathize with their concern but believe they are misguided in calling for more tests.  However, if there must be a federally required standardized test, we should revert to the older norm referenced tests.  There are several reasons.


1. They will take much less classroom time for administration and preparation. Days if not weeks will be freed for more engaging educational experiences. 

2. Teachers will not be forced, by practical necessity, to teach toward a test.   

3. They already exist 

4. Norm referenced tests are more objective. The SBA depends on the judgement of hourly wage earning employee sitting in front of a computer all day reading and judging student essays against a matrix of criteria.  I have done this kind of work and can tell you that the reader/scorers must often guess at which box to mark.  With a norm referenced test, each of the possible answers in a norm referenced test is either correct or incorrect. 


It is true that these older tests are flawed, biased against minorities and provide only very limited information.  However, if they are used properly and in a limited way, they can provide the necessary objective evidence to meet your needs without setting up insurmountable barriers for minority kids. I support the idea of adding graduation rates and attendance rates in the evaluation.  In this you are counting real things and the numbers mean something.  

I agree with many of the ideas within CCSS.  We want our kids to undertake and demonstrate high level skills.  Trying to induce schools to move in this direction by developing new tests is the big mistake. School accountability is a good and necessary thing but too much is counter productive.  I remind you of the little homily commonly attributed to Yeats: “Education is not the filling of a pail but the lighting of a fire ”. I certainly subscribe to the idea. You can’t light fires by testing, only smother them.  Senator Murray should endorse the Washington Tribal Leaders Congress initiative and look toward methods of public demonstration to evaluate high level skills.

In closing, let me say that I believe our public schools to be a cornerstone of democracy and I expect Senator Murray to not only hold them accountable but to protect and nurture them.  Thank you for you time and attention in this matter 


Robey Clark


PS--For your convenience, I summarized my comments about the attached ECAA summary document you presented to us.  They are listed below in italics.  


The claim that the Bill "ends the test based accountability system" of NCLB is belied by the fact that the full regimen of new tests remains.  The number, duration and difficulty of testing in schools will increase profoundly.  Theoretically, states will be able to place whatever value or weight they wish upon the tests within their own evaluation systems.  However, the requirement to publish disaggregated scores for various populations makes the SBA a 600 pound gorilla. Under ECAA, the states need not adopt the CCSS yet they will be judged by a CCSS based test. 

A few days ago, I posted an email I had written to Derek Brown, Director of Assessment with Oregon Department of Education, asking questions about SBAC and ODE's role in supporting or opposing the assessment. Since then, I received answers to my questions. I am posting the questions and answers here. My original email is in grey. Mr. Brown's responded to me in green. His responses have been left where he placed them in his reply to me. My reactions to his responses are in red. I am posting my reactions here only, as I'm not feeling that further conversation with Mr. Brown will be productive at this point. 

Derek,

Thank you for contacting me regarding my questions. First of all, I want to let you know that I am very aware of the fact that much of what goes on around annual testing is due to federal mandates resulting from Oregon’s waiver from No Child Left Behind. You should know that I am not in agreement with how those waivers were implemented. It usurped what should have been the democratic process of reauthorization of ESEA and implemented instead a pet project of Bill Gates, the Common Core Standards, which were not developed with any input from early childhood educators. I am going to assume you are aware of how that happened. If not, you can read about it here, from the Washington Post about a year ago, where Diane Ravitch first began the call for a congressional investigation of Gates’ influence in education policy. I support such an investigation.

I have spent 27 years teaching, principally in elementary schools. What I see has become increasingly disturbing since implementation of NCLB in 2001. The last few years, since Common Core was introduced, have left me with no doubt that anyone who cares about public education should be speaking out against these policies. I note that ODE is not doing that. With Kitzhaber and Mr. Saxton in charge, ODE was either not up front or has been unaware about what these new policies actually mean in practice and how they have changed the way things are done in public schools, most specifically around this new test. 

In spite of assertions to the contrary, these tests remain primarily multiple choice. And I have grave concerns with how the portions of the tests that are not multiple choice are being scored by human raters who are not necessarily educators but rather anyone that AIR or DRC hires (with a four year degree, ostensibly). Doug Kosty, when asked about that by Oregon Save Our Schools members, responded that this was “industry standards and best practices for scoring large-scale assessments” and that “raters are required to possess a 4-year degree in the content area they are scoring.” I see no evidence that shows that the second part of Mr. Kosty’s statement is true. I feel that ODE has been sugar coating what is really going on and has become little more than a compliance agency for failed (and possibly unconstitutional) federal policy. 

I asked basically three questions during the time we were online. First, whether there is any validity to test scores on an ELA exam for students who have already taken ELPA and been designated non-English proficient, perhaps even a level 1 beginner.

 
Brown: "The ELPA and English Language Arts assessments measure distinctly different standards, adopted separately by the state Board of Education. The assessments are designed to be valid measures of each set of standards, respectively.

ESEA section 1111(b)(3)(C)(i) requires that the state assessments “be the same academic assessments used to measure the achievement of all children.” We would be in violation of ESEA if we proposed to use ELPA as a substitute English language arts assessment for English learners. The major philosophical shift in NCLB is to ensure that all students in a state are held to the same high academic expectations."

 
My reaction: My experience and training tells me that this is merely re-testing the student’s level of English acquisition. This is a federal policy that began with NCLB (students must be tested after 1 year in the US) and it is a policy I disagree with. It is a waste of the students’ time and subjects ELs to more testing and takes away more learning time from them than L1 English speakers, which I believe is inequitable. 

I stand by the statement I originally made in the paragraph that follows Mr. Brown’s explanation of why we ask ELs to take an English only assessment of their ability to read, write and reason. This is a re-assessment of their English proficiency and does not assess the same skills it purports to assess for a child whose first language is English. And I see that the principal reason is that it is a federal requirement. I dispute the assertion that NCLB “ensure(s) that all students are held to the same high academic expectations” as well as the reasoning that assumes that even if that were true, it would be a good thing. 


The second question I asked is whether ODE has any plans to respond to concerns that have been raised about the developmental appropriateness of the CCSS for young children.

Brown: "One of the kindergarten standards reads that students should be able to, “read emergent-reader texts with purpose and understanding.” This is a more advanced expectation than Oregon has had in the past. While this standard does not require mastery in reading skills, it does require kindergartners to show they’re making progress.

Student Achievement Partners, a non-profit organization founded by the lead writers of the Common Core State Standards published this brief on developmental appropriateness of the standards."


My reaction: I am not shocked that Student Achievement Partners, a group founded by the lead writers of the Common Core and whose board, advisors and staff are populated by the people who initially worked on the standards, puts forth a paper that supports the standards. There are a number of straw men constructed in their brief as well as a general lack of awareness or denial of how the policies being promoted play out on the ground, in the Kindergarten classroom. I could write a whole blog post on that brief. Maybe I will later.  


Brown: "To further explore this body of work, the Oregon Department of Education and Early Learning Division has a work group dedicated to linking Oregon’s Early Learning Standards and the Kindergarten Common Core State Standards in order to clearly articulate what students should know and be able to do before they enter kindergarten."


My reaction: Too bad Oregon isn’t considering looking at the body of research in Early Childhood Education and Child Development instead of “this body of work” when they link the Early Learning Standards and Kindergarten Common Core. This is not an encouraging sign if you are hoping for play based programs in Oregon’s Early Learning experiences. 


For example, the standards seem to be pushing children to read by the end of Kindergarten. There is no evidence that early reading in any way advantages a child later and in fact, there is evidence that trying to force young children to do things they are not developmentally ready for can be harmful. This concerns me even more when I know that there will be a new focus from ODE on early learning. I have always been a supporter of universal availability of pre-K programs, but I am worried about what types of programs ODE will be advocating for: will those be play-based, developmental programs that are proven to benefit children or a push down of even earlier academic learning requirements that leave children feeling frustrated and with negative attitudes towards reading and school? 

Finally, I asked about the ability of teachers to report errors on test items.


Brown: "Each year we receive feedback on test items from students of all ages.  Test items go through an extensive process of development and review before becoming operational.  As such, we work very hard to mitigate security risks that might inadvertently force us to remove an item from the test.  Educators and content specialists review all test items throughout the development process.  This helps to ensure that a very small percentage of items contain errors.  We appreciate feedback that helps to improve the overall quality of the items and the assessment, but we must also balance such feedback with test validity by establishing policies and procedures that preserve test security."


My reaction: I stand by my assertion that most 8 and 9 year olds will not readily recognize errors nor be persistent enough to report them if they have been told only, “Do your best” and gotten the message that their teacher cannot help them during this exam. Again, lack of awareness or denial of how this plays out with real kids.

As to the test security, it is over the top. These aren’t state secrets. The lack of transparency in the assessments, what data is collected, and what is done with that data is a real problem.


The answer to that is so disturbing to me, especially when we are talking about small children: it is an impropriety for me to even “review” the items and students must identify and report errors. Children under the age of 12 or 13 are almost wholly incapable of doing that. I can’t believe anyone seriously thinks that an 8 or 9 year old is even going to question whether a test their teacher is giving them has errors on it! It also appears to me that when teachers are told they may not even review items, teachers of young children are put in an impossible circumstance, one which results in intense frustration for children who are confused and just want their teacher to be able to answer a question for them and harms the trust that teachers strive to develop with their students.

As someone who is designated to administer these tests, I am placed in a no win situation, a situation that only teachers in grades three through eight (and now grade 11) and then only those who teach English Language Arts or Math face: If I say I don’t wish to sign the confidentiality agreement as it is presented to me, I face disciplinary action. If I say I do not wish to administer the test then, I face disciplinary action as well. I am thus forced to participate in a practice and activity which I feel is harmful to students and violates my professional ethics. 

I am not an outlier in my belief that this is harmful. I am one of many educators who feel this way. This is why many teachers are resigning and retiring early around the country. This is a debate we should have had before implementation of these policies came about, and we were not allowed to have it due to the waiver process. 

I guess my biggest concern and question, when I hear that ODE is meeting with AIR and SBAC people, is who’s running the show?

 
Brown: "We work very closely with Smarter Balanced and our test vendor (AIR) to ensure the highest quality assessment is being delivered.  As with any new test, we learned some important things through the first year of administration and have a number of improvements planned for the 2015-16 school year.  In addition to our Smarter Balanced and AIR partners, we also communicate frequently with the State Board of Education and collect feedback from several advisory groups (made up primarily of educators) to maximize continuous improvement efforts."


My reaction: I’m confused as to why it was stated twice in the webinar call that there would be no changes planned in the length of the tests for the ’15-’16 school year (something which even original proponents like former Deputy Superintendent Rob Saxton now agree is a problem) and that there would be no change in clarifying the instructions for younger students, and yet here we are told that there are going to be changes. Why are some changes possible but not others, even those which most everyone seems to agree on? 



If ODE pushes back on some of what is going on with the SBA (for example, third graders taking tests for up to 12 hours and being reduced to tears in the process) will Smarter Balanced respond? And will ODE push back if they don't like the response? If not, why not? 

I would also like to ask if ODE will be taking any role in the current ESEA reauthorization discussions in the US Congress. If so, what policies will ODE be advocating for, and how will the decision to advocate for particular policies be reached?

 
Brown: "I’m sure ODE and other education policy makers will have a voice in this conversation, but I can’t give you any specifics at this time given the fact that the process hasn’t begun." 


My reaction: Ok, I’m really surprised here. The process for ESEA reauthorization hasn’t begun? Whaaaattt????  I may need to revise my last paragraph a little. 

I appreciate the time you are taking to read and respond to my concerns and questions. It is my sincere hope that ODE would take a leadership role in open public debate and discussion around education policy in our state and nation. Your willingness to respond to my concerns and questions encourages that hope.

Sincerely, 

Kathleen Jeskey