Why Standardized Tests Aren’t Working for Teachers or Students

From Education Week June 19, 2019.  Margaret Pastor – Opinion

A few years ago, an assistant superintendent approached me about the performance of my kindergarten teachers. He had looked at the school’s scores from a commonly used standardized test and had identified an under-performing kindergarten teacher.

He pointed out that in one of my four kindergarten classes, the student scores were noticeably lower, while in another, the students were outperforming the other three classes. He recommended that I have the teacher whose class had scored much lower work directly with the teacher who seemed to know how to get higher scores from her students.

Seems reasonable, right? But here was the problem: The “under-performing” kindergarten teacher and the “high-performing” teacher were one and the same person.