By Request

Imagine you are a doctor.  You have spent many years in school studying medicine, you have been an intern and a resident and now finally you are a doctor.  Now let's say that in the course of a week you see ten patients who are all overweight.  You sit down with each of them and map out a plan for losing those extra pounds.  It includes a healthy diet and some moderate exercise.  Then you reschedule them all for a checkup in six months.

Six months pass and your ten patients return.  One has lost a significant amount of weight, and two more you commend for dropping a good number of pounds.  Five are at the same weight as before, and admit that they have not kept to either the diet or the exercise regimen.  The last two have gained weight.  Only 30% of your overweight patients have made any dent in their problem.

Are you a failure as a doctor?  Most people would say no.  The doctor has no control over the patient.  How many doctors have told smokers to quit or heavy drinkers to cut back?  But we don't blame the doctor  if the patient fails to improve because he fails to follow medical advice.  If the advice is bad, it's on the MD; but if the advice isn't even followed, it's on the patient.

So why are teachers judged as poor if their students fail standardized tests?  Studies have shown that poverty, illness, home environment, and many other factors, when combined, have a far greater effect on student test scores than teachers.  Just like the doctor, we cannot follow our students home and make sure they read in their spare time or study in the evening.  We can't control the time they spend watching TV or at a computer, or even the time they spend at a job for that matter.  We can't be sure they have proper medical care and nutrition or that they get enough sleep so that they come to school ready to learn.  But if only 30% of our students pass a test, it must be poor teaching.  And the current trend in education is to evaluate teachers, pay them or fire them, based on student test scores.  Would you only pay the doctor 30% of his salary because his patients are still overweight?

One last note on the analogy.  Say the doctor tells the patient to follow a vegetarian diet and walk or run x number of miles a day.  Then say the patient follows a different diet and hates running so he takes up cycling or joins some rec-league teams at the YMCA.  And when he comes back he has lost the weight and is healthier.  Three cheers for him.  But in a school every student must take the same test in the same way and learn the same things in the same way.  That is why they call them "standardized" tests, and they are killing our school system.  But that is a topic for another time.