Hello all,
Sorry for my tardiness in posting these closing remarks. I'd like to start
by thanking Hilandia for organizing this panel and inviting me to
participate. I also appreciate everyone's engagement with this issue,
whether you posted something yourself or simply read and thought about what
others had to say. And I very much appreciate being on this panel with Dee
Grayson, whose work puts in place authentic and substantial changes that
promote equity.
The past week at FairTest perfectly illustrates the ways that standardized
tests impact equity at all levels of education. We sent a letter to
Florida decision makers (Governor, Board of Education, members of the FL
Senate Education Committee, members of the FL House Division of Colleges
and Universities, and others) calling their attention to the racial
disparities in who receives a Bright Futures scholarship. This is a
state-funded scholarship program that uses high school GPA and SAT or ACT
scores to determine eligibility. The test score requirements result in
disproportionately few African American and Latino students receiving one
of the awards (which are worth either 100% or 75% tuition at a state public
university, or the equivalent amount at a private college), since students
from these groups score on average substantially lower than Whites and
Asian Americans. So we've suggested that the state drop the test score
requirement and in its stead include criteria such as work experience,
teacher recommendations, extracurricular activities, and future goals.
Using such criteria is an important step in breaking the false notion that
test score equal merit, as students are able to demonstrate other facets of
their capabilities that better reflect their efforts and accomplishments
over four years of high school. If you want to read more about this issue,
I encourage you to visit the FairTest website and read our press release
and accompanying letter at http://www.fairtest.org/pr/Bright_Futures.html
The scholarship issue is a particularly disturbing one to me, and is
indicative of the troubling place standardized tests have come to occupy in
American education. Over the last ten years, the amount of need-based
scholarship money nationally has increased by 100 percent. While that may
sound impressive (and is certainly better than a decrease in money
awarded), it pales when compared with the increase in "merit-based"
scholarship awards (which use criteria such as GPA and test scores) which
have grown by more than 500 percent. Not surprisingly, these awards are
going to those students who are more likely to go to college (and the
scholarship programs therefore are not pulling new students into the higher
education pipeline) and who are more likely to be able to afford college.
Shifts such as the types of scholarships awarded, the dramatic increase in
high-stakes testing, and the backlash against affirmative action and
bilingual education in many states make me wonder what's been going on over
the last ten years. Quite simply, it seems to me that somewhere along the
way the educational system has lost its sense of compassion and equal
opportunity for all. We've stopped talking about public education as a way
to level the playing field for all students, and instead have created
policies that make the playing field even more slanted. For example,
rewards tied to test scores (e.g. scholarship money or bonuses for schools
that do well on state exams) are meted out to students who tend to already
be succeeding in the system. Yet the penalties tied to test scores (e.g.
not receiving a high school diploma, being retained, or not getting in to
college) fall heavily on the shoulders of students who already are
struggling to stay engaged and connected to the system. The penalties come
with few supports for these students, so genuine gains in learning remain
elusive. The education bill's testing program that is about to be passed
in Congress and signed by the President will only exacerbate this trend
tenfold, I fear.
Rather than being discouraged by my perhaps gloomy message, I actually hope
that people reading this will not take this as a message of defeat but
rather as a call to action. I encourage you to get involved in the issue
of testing reform if you aren't already. And if you are already plugging
away at your piece of the testing/equity puzzle, please keep up the good
work. Policies away from equal opportunity and a compassionate educational
system will only continue for as long as we let them.
Thanks for listening to my ranting and ravings. I hope we continue to post
messages about testing on this listserv, since we live in a time when it's
impossible to talk about educational equity without also talking about
standardized testing.
Regards,
Christina Perez
FairTest (christina@fairtest.org)
http://www.fairtest.org
and
TERC (christina_perez@terc.edu)
http://www.terc.edu
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