PSU students challenge Gist to debate
With public school teachers organizing to Dump Gist (they meet today at 4:30 at Cranston West High School) as her continued employment is debated later this week, students from Providence are applying some pressure as well. Following up on the Providence Student Union‘s high-profile action in which adults took the NECAP test, they now want [...]
What are we racing to the top of?
With all the fuss about high stakes testing, the biggest shame is that the Department of Education is telling us that the measure is the answer. A ruler never helped anyone grow an inch. Something other than the test needs to be looked at when 64 percent of the Hispanic or Latino population will not [...]
Report shows education reform isn’t working
A new Economic Policy Institute report that is highly critical of the so-called “education reform” movement reads like an indictment of Deborah Gist’s tenure as commissioner of public schools in Rhode Island. The report compares large urban school districts with New York, Chicago and Washington DC – three cities that have implemented strategies almost identical [...]
Dump Deborah Gist
Deborah Gist is nothing if not polarizing. Nearly 90 percent of local teachers want a new leader. But the Chamber of Commerce supports her. She backed the firing of Central Falls teachers, but she has the backing of the East Greenwich School Committee. Tom Sgouros and the Providence Student Union have twisted her in knots [...]
Our schools and the truth about policy
The commissioner of education has an op-ed in the Providence Journal this morning. Entitled “Our Schools and the Truth about Testing” it painted a rosy picture of what high performance in schools means: “Every high-performing school I have ever visited has been a vibrant, rich educational environment where learning is fun and well-rounded, and where [...]
More illogic from RIDE
In a reply to my post about sneaky changes in the NECAP documentation, the RI Department of Education spokesman wrote this: “The NECAP assessment is designed to measure whether students have attained the knowledge and skills expected at each grade level, that is, whether students have met grade-level standards.” This, of course, is the heart [...]
Department of Education responds to Sgouros post
Tom Sgouros’ post showing that Deborah Gist and the Department of Education of covered up and altering published descriptions of the NECAP test’s veracity as a graduation requirement caused quite a stir yesterday. As such, RIDE spokesman Elliot Krieger sent me this email yesterday afternoon: Commissioner Gist has been forthright about the changes in our [...]
Students missing math classes needed for NECAP
More than a third of Providence high school students who took the NECAP test in October may not have taken either the necessary algebra or geometry classes to fare well on the test, according to the Providence Student Union. A full13 percent of NECAP test takers haven’t taken either algebra and geometry in school, the [...]
Sneaky changes in NECAP documentation
The NECAP-as-graduation-test has occupied a lot of my attention recently. As I have written before, the NECAP test is a fundamentally different kind of test than one you would use as a graduation test. The questions you’d put on a graduation test are exactly the ones that the test designers consider a waste of time [...]
Gist surprised teachers don’t like her
Education Commissioner Deborah Gist said she was surprised and by the widespread lack of support among local teachers for her and her policies that a new Fleming and Associates poll revealed yesterday. 85 percent of teachers asked said they didn’t want her contract renewed. “I’ll definitely take it seriously,” she said. After she delivered the [...]
Dueling speeches on reforming education
There were two speeches on reforming education at the State House last night – Deborah Gist gave the annual State of Education speech inside and outside the Providence Student Union gave the State of the Student speech. The Providence Journal covered both Gist’s speech and the PSU speeches. You can read their coverage here.
Poll: Local teachers don’t like Deborah Gist
Deborah Gist isn’t very popular with the educators she is supposed to be the leading, a new poll by Fleming and Associates indicates. Almost 90 percent of teachers asked for the poll felt that moral in Rhode Island public schools is not good. More than 80 percent of the local teachers polled said they feel [...]
2 speech Tuesday: State of Education; State of Student
Deborah Gist has been doing her darnedest to ignore the Providence Student Union as of late. But before her annual “State of Education” speech tomorrow night at the State House, they will be giving the inaugural “State of the Student” speech there as well. “Students are the ones who actually experience the “State of Education” [...]
Boston Globe Says No To NECAP Requirement
An editorial in today’s Boston Globe recommends that Rhode Island not use the NECAP test as a graduation requirement. While Education Commissioner Deborah Gist keeps comparing the NECAP to Massachusetts MCAT, the state’s biggest newspaper agree with what Tom Sgouros has been writing about on RI Future: The fundamental problem, though, is that the test [...]
How RIDE Undermines Their Own NECAP Test
If I had to pick one thing to complain about with the high-stakes NECAP testing regime it wouldn’t be the pressure on the students, the deformation of the curriculum, or any of that. If it was just one thing, it wouldn’t even be the misguided policy to use NECAP as a graduation test. It would [...]
Another Issue With High Stakes Testing: Cheating
Education reformers in Atlanta have raised another potential concern with high stakes testing. The 2009 superintendent of the year and 34 Atlanta educators were indicted Friday for allegedly running a racket to change students’ answers on standardized tests so they would seem more proficient than they actually are. I guess this is the superman we’ve [...]
Students Statewide Should Boycott NECAP
It is a bright autumn day in early to mid October. Students from all over the state are sitting quietly in rows. On their desks are booklets and number 2 pencils. It’s NECAP time. Soon the teacher gives the O.K. to begin and in unison kids take out a book and begin reading instead. Thus [...]
URI Psychometrician Agrees With Tom Sgouros
I promised last time to write about the other psychometrician I encountered last week. His name is Peter Merenda, and he’s something of a psychometrician’s psychometrician. He’s written a textbook about testing, along with another book on statistical analysis and about 250 articles in various journals. He’s won prizes, fellowships, awards. He founded the URI [...]
Psychometrics R Us
A few days ago, I wrote about the NECAP test, and the statistical goals of its designers. Since then, I’ve been called “not a psychometrician” on the radio, among other things. I hear that Monday I was insulted on John DePetro’s show, too. So I thought I’d provide accounts of what a couple of psychometricians [...]
A Civics Lesson For Ed. Commissioner Gist
Commissioner Gist does not appear to be someone I would recommend to teach high school civics. In fact, I believe she should go back to high school and retake the course. While there she can learn about the value of participating in our democracy, and meet many wonderful Providence students. Our state education commissioner thought [...]
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