EVERYWHERE, the teachers have torn emotions.
Part of them, well aware that the public wants a rigorous curriculum, likes the idea of ratcheting up academic standards.
But, oh, those high-stakes tests and the pressure that accompanies them! The MSPAP pep rallies and the weeks of springtime test preparation!
Standards, in short, are OK, but the Maryland School Performance Assessment Program is a headache.
Several recent polls have uncovered these conflicting emotions. For example, eight in 10 teachers surveyed nationally by Education Week for the publication's 2001 "Quality Counts" report card, said the curriculum has become "somewhat" or "a lot" more demanding, and six in 10 said expectations for what children should learn are "somewhat" or "a lot" higher.
At the same time, nearly seven in 10 said instruction stresses tests like MSPAP "far too much" or "somewhat too much," while nearly half reported spending "a great deal" of time prepping for the tests.
"Tests may be looming too large in the classroom," Lynn Olson, project editor of the Education Week report, told the Maryland Board of Education yesterday. Several heads in the audience nodded in agreement, including that of Patricia A. Foerster, president of the Maryland State Teachers Association. MSTA has found similar sentiment among Maryland's 50,000 teachers.
Then, too, Foerster said, there's the inevitable "finger-pointing" that occurs in too many schools as highly stressed principals single out equally stressed teachers when MSPAP scores go south.
Olson doesn't predict a letup in test mania nationally. The so-called "standards movement" has reached every state, and many are testing to beat the band. Meanwhile, President Bush wants the states to test every child in grades three through eight. Bush would have the federal government share in the cost -- in Maryland's case, about $25 a student for MSPAP and $5 a student for the standardized Comprehensive Test of Basic Skills (CTBS).
A number of respected people and organizations are concerned. Last month, the American Educational Research Association sent a memo to state education leaders, urging them to take stock and ask themselves a few questions. When test scores rise, is it because students are learning better? Or, instead, are students overly familiar with the test? Does the testing program help improve education for students who need it most, such as those in high-poverty schools?
Maryland and the other states need to answer these questions and others. It's a delicate trick, balancing the need for tougher academic standards against the equally pressing need to assess the results.
Bleak picture of MSPAP painted in teacher survey
Here's another survey that's harshly critical of MSPAP.
Donald B. Hofler, recently retired education professor at Loyola College, polled 199 educators in eight Maryland counties and Baltimore City. Hofler asked the teachers to agree or disagree with a series of statements such as, "The MSPAP encourages teacher creativity." Fifty-eight percent strongly disagreed.
Large majorities said MSPAP is inappropriate for its three grade levels, particularly the third grade. The teachers also complained about the readability of tasks on the test.
Hofler said schools should do away with MSPAP pep rallies, exclude the scores of special-education students in their final results and begin the testing in a grade higher than third.
Hofler has been an outspoken critic of MSPAP since its inception.
