<p>“What content of the NY Regents or elementary exams do you object to your child being tested on?”</p>
<p>The dumbed down curriculum content.</p>
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<p>Ok, that’s not very specific, but I think I know what you mean. </p>
<p>Did your child score 100% on all of those tests? None of my children did. One scored very high, the other pretty high, and the third was quite average. That told me that my kids had not learned all the material, so either it was not too dumbed down, or my kids are not that smart or educated.</p>
<p>Bay, I’m not an educator so I’m not qualified to say but I believe it needs to more in line with actually teaching students to the curriculum rather than to the test. If your schools don’t do this consider yourself fortunate, and please recognize this is why others are concerned about it’s impact on education.</p>
<p>We have a huge issue in Florida where teachers are pressured to teach to the FCAT test and students miss out on actual learning.</p>
<p>[Teacher</a> Evaluations To Be Based Upon FCAT Scores | NBC 6 South Florida](<a href=“Teacher Evaluations To Be Based Upon FCAT Scores – NBC 6 South Florida”>Teacher Evaluations To Be Based Upon FCAT Scores – NBC 6 South Florida)</p>
<p>She and other critics of the evaluation process say the biggest, obvious flaw is that some teachers will be evaluated based on subjects they don’t teach, based on the performance of students who are never in their classrooms</p>
<p>Ok, I concede that I am not expert on teacher evaluations. I’d like to see them done, though. Then I’d be all over the crusade to increase teacher pay.</p>
<p>As far as standardized tests in our public schools go, they seem quite benign to me. The worst two I ever experienced were when my S took the ISEE for a private school admission, and the entire SAT/ACT process. Neither of those have anything to do with our public school standardized testing.</p>
<p>“As it is now, there is virtually no teacher accountability in our public schools.”</p>
<p>I disagree with this statement as it relates to this particular state.</p>
<p>There ARE teacher evaluations mostly based on classroom observation/evaluation.</p>
<p>And you wouldn’t BELIEVE the other things teachers are held accountable for - like disciplining/counseling students regarding online bullying, etc. If they manage social conflicts incorrectly, they can be fired, moved to another grade level, made fairly miserable, etc.</p>
<p>Instead of blaming teachers, we need to take a look at the systems. Teachers want to do a good job, and they’d like to actually teach. They need support from the state and they need to be valued, and they need to be freed up to teach rather than be policemen, counselors, social workers, and the scapegoats.</p>
<p>it’s not really the testing that is at issue, the FCAT tests frankly are quite benign,my own kids did quite well on them. </p>
<p>The real issue is that the focus within the classroom becomes on test prep, and with teachers’ evals tied to test scores that will only intensify. I predict we’ll see yet more testing cheating scandals like the one in Atlanta.</p>
<p>Well said, cromette.</p>
<p>The divergence in practices among states and even schools within states makes it almost impossible to have a coherent conversation on the topic of teachers and testing.</p>
<p>That’s why I’d rather talk about Matt Damon! :)</p>
<p>I object to teacher evaluations being tied to standardized testing scores. NOW, that being said, some independent evaluation of student knowledge at the beginning of the year vs. exit exams might be a better measure.</p>
<p>The majority of standardized testing, and the systems used to administer the tests are fairly useless as far as I’ve been able to determine. I pretty much hate them. I think we’re going about it all wrong.</p>
<p>Call me crazy, but wouldn’t it make sense to study what other countries with more successful educational outcomes are doing right? And to tailor our curricula (especially in STEM) to begin to keep pace with theirs?</p>
<p>I still don’t have a problem with Matt, or anything he’s said, really. Tying teacher evaluations to standardized testing and teaching to the test is no good.</p>
<p>We need to change the way we think about classrooms, education, a “right” to education in a main-streamed classroom, teachers, testing, standards, and pretty much everything. </p>
<p>We could do so much better than we are doing. We should hold more than the teacher accountable. How about the student? How about the parents? How about the state? How about the administration? How about the labor unions? How about the teachers’ education programs in each state?</p>
<p>I agree cromette…</p>
<p>Bay, yes, talking about Matt Damon is more entertaining, I personally admire him, and think Good Will Hunting probably portrays his values and beliefs about education.</p>
<p>sally, I think there’s a lot out there we could learn from others. I think we should keep that in mind.</p>
<p>But what I really prefer is the “back to the drawing board” approach. We should start over. Decide the outcome we want to see, and then develop a system to produce the desired outcome…from scratch. It’s not rocket science. It’s done in industry all the time.</p>
<p>“Did your child score 100% on all of those tests?”</p>
<p>No.</p>
<p>“Call me crazy, but wouldn’t it make sense to study what other countries with more successful educational outcomes are doing right? And to tailor our curricula (especially in STEM) to begin to keep pace with theirs?”</p>
<p>We did that thread already a few months ago. You should have read some of the reasons why it’s impossible to do here what they do in other countries - your head would explode.</p>
<p>I’ll still be interested to see how that pilot program turns out. ;)</p>
<p>I haven’t read most or all of this thread but I had a couple of things to mention.</p>
<p>First, as to what is on standardized tests that is objectionable, the history questions are very whitewashed/pro-American on the NYS Regents. For example, I encountered essentially the same question on the Regents and AP US history test the year that I took them, with one notable difference. On the AP exam, the question referred to Theodore Roosevelt “policing” Latin America (accurate), but on the Regents, Theodore Roosevelt “helped” Latin America. </p>
<p>Also a lot of the English Regents passages are total nonsense. I completely bull****ed my answer to one and got a 100 on the exam. Unless being full of crap is a NY graduation requirement I don’t think this test is doing its job.</p>
<p>Some may have seen this before but it’s worth sharing again. It’s a link to a teacher’s resignation letter that went somewhat viral on Facebook. I have several friends who attended this high school and they said that this teacher was one of the best they’d ever had. He was so beloved by his students that he was voted to speak at graduation by the student body so often that the administrators frequently had to tell the students they needed to pick someone else. </p>
<p>[Teacher?s</a> resignation letter: ?My profession ? no longer exists?](<a href=“http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2013/04/06/teachers-resignation-letter-my-profession-no-longer-exists/]Teacher?s”>http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2013/04/06/teachers-resignation-letter-my-profession-no-longer-exists/)</p>
<p>Funny how this teacher starts the letter by lamenting that by resigning he won’t be getting a golden parachute. Boohoo. Then he says he hopes he can come back so he can double dip. Wow, this guy really has a set.</p>
<p>I stopped reading right there.</p>
<p>Any you are complaining the curriculum isn’t anti-American enough? Hahaha.</p>
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<p>Some immigrants try to recreate aspects of their native educational systems here. Many Asian-American parents send their children to after-school or weekend academic programs. Chinese parents, in particular, organize such schools, which offer not just Chinese classes but math classes, taught by the abundance of Chinese-American mathematicians, scientists, and engineers, that are more advanced than what is being taught in the public schools. Innate ability may partially explain why so many math contest winners are Chinese, but these prep programs also play a role. In recent years Indians have dominated spelling and geography bees, boosted by the North South Foundation, a group of Indian parents that organizes academic contests for their children.</p>
<p>Even “good” neighborhood public schools teach toward the middle and do not push children much, especially through middle school. Their leveling aims will be frustrated by the Tiger Mothers who afterschool. Parents differ in the degree of academic intensity they desire for their children, and a voucher system would accommodate that.</p>
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<p>(This is from the letter linked above.) riprorin, you started this thread. Why wouldn’t you want to understand a teacher’s perspective? Why do you only care about the earned retirement benefits the teacher might be negotiating as he leaves? Once again, your agenda and lack of interest in actually having a discussion come through.</p>