I've been thinking a great deal about data. Not that I'm some sort of math whiz, but educational data. See, years ago, educational reformers decided that students are data points rather than human beings, and teachers have been forced to closely examine the data to determine if their students are learning.
There are many fallacies about educational data. For one, there's no context. School districts gather loads of data about our students, like economics, ethnic origin, gender, but there's no true individual element of information gathered, like mental illness, hunger, abuse.
Data is manipulated to achieve a particular effect. For example, my colleagues learned this week that my AP class scores dropped in comparison to last year's students. I saw the bar graph displayed in all its glory with the two different years of results displayed, but there was no context provided. In reality, I had fewer students take the test this year, but their results exceeded the national average in all measurable areas. In my AP English subject area, test scores dropped across the United States. So yes, my scores dropped from last year, but I still exceeded the national average for this year.
I'm no supporter of standardized testing. I believe this push to test the shit out of kids has harmed them psychologically. My students feel tremendous stress and anxiety about their tests, and our institutions don't help much. We practice and practice and practice, and the kids feel worse and worse about their performances. We wonder why kids need anti-depressants and anti-anxiety medications, considering them "weaker" than previous generations or blaming technology for these issues. No one considers the pressures of taking a yearly test and the amount of pressure teachers are forced to place on our students to perform well.
Back in my day, we took the Iowa Test of Basic Skills every couple of years. There was no pressure, no academies, no pre and post tests to worry about. We just did it, got our results and moved on.
I've spent all week thinking about, talking about, and looking at data. As of today, my students have been reduced to high achiever, mid-achiever, and low achiever. I know nothing about them except how they've performed on a standardized test. A snapshot of one day in their lives. I am saddened by the reality each child is a piece of data used to measure ME rather than a human being making progress in my learning environment.
My other complaint is this: when students do well on a standardized test, they are complimented. Teachers, admin say, "This was a good group of kids!" No credit is given to the teachers who worked themselves to exhaustion help kids achieve those scores. However, when kids don't do as well, criticism is leveled at the teachers; we didn't do enough, we need to do better. We can't win. Apparently we aren't responsible for student success just student failure.
School starts tomorrow, as does testing windows and data collection. I will walk into my room filled with young, curious minds eager to learn, and throughout the rest of the year, I will be forced to determine their achievement levels. There is no humanity.
