Progressive Education National Network

[Katy]

After the publication of A Nation At Risk in 1983, a reform movement was born in the United States. The reform movement gave birth to people who wanted evidence that the reform movement was successful, thus the testing and the standards movement was born. In 2006, some people say that testing has become the reform, and that testing drives education.

We live in an age of standards and high stakes testing and demands for proof that quality education is occurring in schools. Progressive educators say that we should be preparing students to be contributing members of the democracy. These two goals for education can collide in practice.

Deborah Meier’s book, Will Standards Save Public Education? is a thoughtful forum about standards and standardized testing. In the book, while commenting on high stakes testing, she says, “Educators from the progressive tradition are often accused of ‘experimenting’ on kids. But never in the history of the nation have progressives proposed an experiment so dramatic, vast, and potentially serious in its real-life impact on millions of young people. If the consequences are other than those its supporters (of high stakes testing) hope for, the harm to the nation’s educational system and the youngsters involved—maybe even to our economy---will be large and hard to undo.”

Alfie Kohn challenges everyone to look up rigor in the dictionary and discover the definition. Among the possibilities are: strictness; inflexibility; harshness of judgment; hardship of living; austerity; muscular rigidity. Let’s not forget that rigor mortis means the stiffening of the body after death.

As educators, we know that students need to actively engage in the learning process for it to be meaningful and successful. We understand the process of helping students see connections between what they learn in school and the real world.

Following the National Progressive Education Conference at The School in Rose Valley last year, one of the themes that emerged was the challenge of communicating the value of progressive education when the markers that exist for measuring success in the public sector are not relevant or reflective of success in progressive programs.

How do you respond when people want to know how your progressive school or classroom prepares kids for a world of standards, tests, and rigor?

[Sally Vale]

This is such a good question, but it is hard to answer. It is something that my school struggles with all the time. We tell people about how successful our graduates are, but people have to be willing to listen to the stories. Some people think that because we don't test kids, we can't really know if we are preparing them for other schools. I think it is easy for parents to look at test scores, but it is hard to have faith in an open, organic system.

I hope to learn something from other schools.

[James Silver]

So how did rigor gain such credibility? Isn't it interesting that so many people think rigor is a good thing and ask for it?

[Stacie]

We do it with lots of conversation, but that method is not very efficient. People who are strangers to our school don't have the opportunity to understand us or learn about us.

[Sue Mason]

Interesting to think of testing as the reform. It is true that we have lost sight of educating and have moved all the focus to tests and evidence. This is so frustrating to me as an educator. I used to have a great 5th grade program, but my school put so much pressure on me to improve my test scores and drop the interesting curriculum, that I requested a move to 1st grade where they don't test the kids. I miss the 5th graders and all the great things we did. Those kids were really prepared for middle school and did really well in school, they just didn't have the highest scores on the standardized testing.

Are we doomed to focus on testing forever? Has anyone ever tried to change the testing mania?

[Barb]

I think there is a group called Fair Test. Does anyone know what they are doing or how to find out about them?

[Sabine]

I want to address just the part of the question that asks about "the challenge of communicating the value of progressive education when the markers that exist for measuring success in the public sector are not relevant or reflective of success in progressive programs." Implicit in framing the question in this way is the supposition that markers for success in the public sector, whatever those may be, carry more weight than whatever the measure of progressive programs' success is as defined by the progressive programs (presumably something not easily quantifiable.)

How does one talk about the value of progressive education (or any worthwhile education) when it is not considered as an end in itself?[/u]

[Jeff]

Sabine I don't really understand what you mean. Are you saying that there are common markers for success that progressive schools just don't use?

I have to think more about it, but I think I agree with your last line. Are you saying that education should be an end in itself? Wouldn't that be a shift for people to accept that concept?

[Sabine]

Jeff, thank you for asking me to clarify my post.

I'm not sure what the markers for measuring success in the public sector are, but the discussion seems to be about tests and grades, and that these are not "relevant or reflective of success in progressive programs." If that is the case, then why are we trying to describe the success of progressive programs as compared with the public sector in common terms?

With respect to your question about whether I'm saying that education should be an end in itself, I'll say that if education is not an end in itself, then it's object must be something other than to be educated. I think we have to decide what the object of an education is in order to be able to talk about whether an educational program has been successful.

[Monty Neill]

[Nick]

Sabine's question gets to the root of an important issue. What is the purpose of schooling? It is a question that on the surface many people assume is so obvious why ask it. But once we do ask it, we realize that the answer is not so simple. There are multiple answers, and we don't all agree on all of them, or certainly not their relative importance. Is it to get a job? To help the U.S. economy? to create citizens of our democracy? What is a good citizen then? To help students reach their "full potential"? To keep kids off the streets? To sort students for the job market? Only when we answer this question can we decide how we would want to measure whether we have succeeded.

There seems to be a false consensus by the "general public" that this question has been answered, and an acceptance that test scores measure this success. One job we have as progressive educators is to bring to light that the first question has not been answered. We also need to point out that the tests currently used actually don't measure ANY of the above possiblities very well.

[Sarah Lawler]

I agree with Sabine and Nick.

Sabine asks: why are we trying to describe progressive success in common terms?

I would guess it is because the philosophical discussion is too complicated, and test scores are easier for most people.

[gsherif]

I say "My school has an explicit commitment to cultivating each student's individuality. We also strive to ensure that self-motivated students (and teachers) consider the influence that they will have on others within a civil society."

This may seem obvious. But I see so many decisions and policies that are generated from any of the following:

political expediency
maintenance of an informal or formal power structure
one-sided deference to behaviorism
and/or low expectations of students/faculty

I believe that if we start out asking "How will this benefit students?" with an eye to integrating individual liberty and social responsibility, then our students & colleagues will experience worthwhile learning more often.
_________________
Gamal D. Sherif
www.ProgressEd.org