The Prospect speaks with an education-policy expert Linda Darling-Hammond about standardized testing in the implementation of Common Core, a national set of guidelines on math and reading.
One of the most contentious debates racking state houses this year isn't about Obamacare, inequality, or even jobs. It's the implementation of the Common Core State Standards, which set benchmarks for what students should know in math and language arts at each grade level. At the current count, 44 states and the District of Columbia have signed on.
Some conservative legislators have objected to what they see as a step toward federalizing education; Indiana has withdrawn from the initiative and 11 states are considering bills to slow or derail Common Core implementation. Another source of friction is the adoption of standardized testing to measure students' knowledge of Common Core standards and, in some cases, evaluate teachers. The assessments have been designed by two state groups—the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) and the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium—but a growing number of states are opting out and instead coming up with their own. Many education scholars also contend the tests don't assess students’ multiple intelligences and connect to real-world skills and tasks.
Stanford education professor Linda Darling-Hammond, who led President Obama’s education-policy transition team after his election in 2008, is one such figure. She is also a member of the Gordon Commission for the Future of Assessment and Education, a group of scholars overseeing the implementation of the Common Core. The Prospect sat down with Darling-Hammond to discuss the role of standardized testing in the adoption of Common Core and what the tests miss in evaluating student performance.
What is the role of standardized testing in the implementation of the “Common Core” curriculum?
When people talk about Common Core, they often mean the high-stakes tests attached to the standards and not the Common Core itself. Testing is not required by the Common Core. You can see that in the way the curriculum is being implemented across the country. In places like New York that include standardized testing in the Common Core, people are really talking about the tests and the high stakes attached to them. In a place like California, where the Common Core is being implemented without any high-stakes tests, there's much less anxiety and debate about the value of the actual standards.
Some states have opted out of using the tests developed by PARCC and Smarter Balanced. How does the goal of a national curriculum succeed if you have different testing regimes?
In my own view, the tests are not the most important thing. In fact, you have countries like Finland that have a national curriculum and have no external tests whatsoever, which surprises many Americans because they perform on the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) tests near the top of the world. But they don't get there by driving students and teachers and schools with external tests. They just don't have them. They do all of their assessment locally within schools, around the national curriculum. So, the national curriculum does have guidance for assessments, but the tests should not be driving the curriculum.
Read the full story in The American Prospect.
Read Linda Darling-Hammond's paper Criteria for High-Quality Assessment Creating Systems of Assessment for Deeper Learning.
Read an article about five Common Core myths.
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