Standardized Tests

Tweet stuff Re "Twitter photo drama hounds congressman from New York," June 2 Step away from the keyboard! Imagine how much more work everyone (including New York Democratic Rep. Anthony Weiner) would accomplish, how many real relationships would be developed and maintained, if everyone wouldn't be addicted to the false notion that they are the center of the universe and everyone really wants to know what they're having for lunch or that they need to spew every thought without really having thought about it. This goes for emails, instant messages and — the latest waste of time and savager of reputation — Twitter.

The Los Angeles Unified school board did an injustice to hundreds of students and to the school reform movement when it overrode the recommendation of its staff and decided not to close a low-performing charter school. Academia Semillas del Pueblo in El Sereno is run by dedicated educators who are striving to provide their kindergarten-through-eighth-grade students with a safe environment, a lively and enriched curriculum, as well as skills in three languages. The school has been controversial because one of those languages is an indigenous language of Mexico, and part of the school's mission is to instill in children an understanding and appreciation of their cultural heritage.

Re "Tests Fail the Grade," editorial, July 4: In your opinion, "As California demands more from students and teachers, results from standardized tests must be . . . absolutely trustworthy." If you wish standardized tests to be "absolutely trustworthy" you do not understand the nature of standardized tests or accurate procedures for evaluation of student achievement. Standardized tests are a "snapshot." They are one kind of evaluation of a student on a given day. According to Grant Wiggins, a specialist in student evaluation, Stanford 9-type tests have an error factor of 60 points: Students given the identical test on different days could yield scores within a 60-point range.

Hundreds of photos of standardized tests have begun to appear on social-networking sites in California, raising concerns about test security and cheating by students. In the worst-case scenario, the photos could lead to invalidating test scores for entire schools or prevent the state from using certain tests. For now, officials have warned school districts to heighten test security and investigate breaches. Students are not allowed to have access to cellphones or other devices that can take pictures when the tests are administered.

Re "Value of Standardized Tests," editorial, May 31: In order to generate the comparisons in student performance that you claim are indispensable for judging educational quality, standardized test-makers need to create differences among student scores. If test-makers included only items measuring the most important content emphasized by teachers, scores might be too similar, making comparisons unsatisfactory. To engineer score spread, test-makers build into standardized tests items assessing content that is highly unlikely to be taught in class.

The Compton Unified School District recently came under criticism from state officials, in part because its students have ranked low on standardized tests. How accurate are standardized tests at measuring student achievement, and are they the best method to measure students' success at learning in school? Kelvin Filer, Board member , Compton Unified School District "I don't think that standardized tests are a good tool to use for measuring a student's capabilities.

Simple justice and workplace realities demand that American schools and employers stop relying on flawed standardized tests to decide who gets ahead, a private commission said today. Low test scores should "never stigmatize an individual as a failure or permanently restrict the individual's life choices," the Ford Foundation's National Commission on Testing and Public Policy said in a report.

I am eyeing with confusion four separate tests that my third-grade stepson took this last school year. The Stanford 9 test indicates that he is far below basic in math and at grade level in reading. The California state achievement test indicates he is far below basic in reading and at grade level in math. He was tested one-on-one at the Sylvan Learning Center, where he was being tutored, and again one-on-one by the school district psychologist to see if he qualified for special education services.

First it was on, then off, then on again. When legislators left Sacramento last weekend, they had given Gov. Pete Wilson the prize that he had insisted on all summer: a standardized test that would make it possible to compare the performance of school districts, schools and even individual pupils across the state. Who: All public school students in grades 2 through 11 will be tested. What: An "off-the-shelf" test--immediately available from a testing company--for each grade.

Teachers union leader Albert Shanker called Saturday for an immediate end to multiple-choice standardized achievement testing, saying the results are misleading and may even be hindering school reform.

They were not even born at the time their city erupted in flames, violence and rage against a system that would not convict Los Angeles police officers of brutally beating a black man. But high school students Jiaya Ingram, Ashley Torres and Jessica Maldonado have been gripped by accounts of the 1992 Los Angeles riots as they learn about them through poetry and plays, readings and recollections of their parents and others. They say they felt shock over police actions, horror over the mob violence and an uneasy feeling that it could happen again, particularly as unarmed African Americans are killed, most recently in Florida, Oklahoma and Pasadena.

There are plenty of problems with the school reform movement, but the number of standardized tests isn't one of them. The tests are still the most objective and affordable yardsticks of achievement available. They should be improved and the results should be kept in perspective, but there is no evidence that cutting back on them — as Gov. Jerry Brown has proposed — will improve education. Students in California take more annual standards tests than are mandated by the federal No Child Left Behind Act. The state tests students in English and math each year through 11th grade; federal law requires that, in high school, the tests be given just once.

Deviating sharply from education reform policies championed by President Obama, California Gov. Jerry Brown is calling for limits on standardized testing and reduced roles for federal and state government in local schools. Brown's positions, outlined in Wednesday's State of the State address, align closely with the state's two major teachers unions, but also embody Brown's independent streak. The governor's call for a reduction in standardized testing comes at a time when such tests are gaining influence across the nation, due in part to heavy federal support.

Backward thinking Re "Clueless candidates," Editorial, Nov. 23 Your editorial exposing the clueless, arcane, 19th century policy positions of GOP presidential candidates — focusing on Newt Gingrich's call to roll back child labor laws — was brilliant. It reminded me of the famous scene in "Blazing Saddles" in which the Waco Kid explains this kind of folly to Sheriff Bart: "What did you expect? 'Welcome, sonny'? 'Make yourself at home'? 'Marry my daughter'?

California voters want teachers' performance evaluations made public, a new poll has found. And most also want student test scores factored into an instructor's review. Of those surveyed, 58% said the quality of public schools would be improved if the public had access to teachers' reviews; 23% said it would not help or could make things worse. "They want to see the evaluations," said Linda DiVall, the chief executive of American Viewpoint, a Republican firm that co-directed the bipartisan poll for the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences and the Los Angeles Times.

The stress was overwhelming. For years, this veteran teacher had received exemplary evaluations but now was feeling pressured to raise her students' test scores. Her principal criticized her teaching and would show up to take notes on her class. She knew the material would be used against her one day. "My principal told me right to my face that she — she was feeling sorry for me because I don't know how to teach," the instructor said. The Los Angeles educator, who did not want to be identified, is one of about three dozen in the state accused this year of cheating, lesser misconduct or mistakes on standardized achievement tests.

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Teachers at their annual union convention in Miami Beach voted to oppose any standardized national tests for students, a goal sought by President Bush. The National Education Assn. feels the testing homogenizes the students and would be "contrary to the diverse interests and needs of children," according to the resolution passed by delegates in a voice vote. The President's Education Policy Advisory Committee had proposed national standards and tests to measure student performance.

When it comes to federal school reform, the overriding lesson is to be careful what you wish for. The No Child Left Behind Act, signed into law in 2002, ushered in an era of badly needed educational accountability, requiring schools to improve the lot of disadvantaged, black and Latino students who up to that point had been shorted academically in almost every way. But the law was so poorly written, so laden with rigid, arbitrary standards, that it...

For the first time, Los Angeles school principals will see previously confidential ratings that estimate teachers' effectiveness in raising students' standardized test scores. Los Angeles Unified officials began issuing the ratings privately to about 12,000 math and English teachers last year and plan to issue new ones this month to about 14,000 instructors, including some who teach science and history. The scores are based on an analysis the district calls Academic Growth over Time.