Dive Brief:
- In a letter sent Tuesday to President Barack Obama, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, and congressional leaders, a coalition of 11 civil rights organizations called for an end to the K-12 test-based "accountability system," the Washington Post reported.
- In the letter, the groups said such a system undermines “critical supports and services” in addition to, in some cases, watering down curriculum to the point that students don't attain the 21st century skills they need. They ended their letter with a number of recommendations for creating new, non-test-based accountability systems.
- The letter also provided recommendations for a new accountability system not based on standardized testing. Current test-based systems are written into most states' laws, as they were a requirement for those states to receive No Child Left Behind waivers.
Dive Insight:
In recent months, there has been pushback against test-based accountability systems, especially after statisticians from the American Statistical Association (ASA) rejected the widely popular “value-added method” (VAM) for conducting teacher evaluations. They said it was unreliable because the VAM formula is too focused on standardized test scores and, as a result, doesn't account for teacher value toward other student outcomes. Additionally, they said, “VAM typically measure correlation, not causation: Effects – positive or negative – attributed to a teacher may actually be caused by other factors that are not captured in the model.”
The 11 civil rights groups that signed Tuesday's letter include: Advancement Project, Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF), National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, National Opportunity to Learn (OTL) Campaign, National Urban League (NUL), NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund (LDF), National Council on Educating Black Children (NCEBC), National Indian Education Association (NIEA) and Southeast Asia Resource Action Center (SEARAC).