Maybe the Government Operations and Audit Committee’s usurpation of the Secretary of Education’s authority will be good for South Dakota. GOAC chair Senator Ryan Maher (R-28/Isabel) told the Executive Board Monday that he’s ready to shake up the department’s focus on standardized tests, and E-Board members said okee-dokee:
Senator Ryan Maher told the Legislature’s Executive Board that the Government Operations and Audit Committee he chairs has named a subgroup to work with the state Department of Education.
The Isabel Republican said they’re focused on students’ performances on the department’s standardized assessments.
Senator Jim Bolin, a Canton Republican, said the department perhaps had “unwise” indicators in the past but stressed that only teachers and students have control.
Bolin, a former teacher and school administrator, said many students don’t see a direct relationship between the standardized testing and their admission to college or technical school.
“I want to make sure that is on the record,” Bolin said. He said it’s not-possible for the department to control the scores and the tests have “limited value.”
Senate Democratic leader Troy Heinert of Mission said there has been too much emphasis on just the tests and there should be a broader look at what schools are doing [Bob Mercer, “South Dakota Lawmakers Want More Influence in K-12 Education Policies,” KELO-TV, 2019.11.19].
Senators Maher and Heinert (but not Bolin!) were among those with the good sense to vote to kill Governor Kristi Noem’s ill-advised attempt to add a civics exam to the regimen of state-mandated tests last Session. Perhaps they can now broaden their attention to scaling back the standardized testing mandates that turn school weeks into mostly unproductive testingpaloozas of test prep sessions, topsy-turvy schedules, and carboloading that eat away at the time teachers have for actual teaching.
Standardized tests can be useful to teachers, parents, students and administrators if the data are used the right way. The tests can provide a lot of data that could be used diagnostically, but that data is usually averaged to the point where it becomes useless, even misleading.
Find a way to make it useful for the frontline educators, or scrap it.
This is excellent news. The standardized tests are a waste of money since each person learns differently and has different skills.
We home school three kids. They are all doing very well in certain areas, and most of their most amazing talents are not even represented on the tests!
The other day, we had our first Harvard Computer Science online lecture coupled with a computer science project in Java.
Computer Science is not even on the tests, yet arguably is the most important thing they can be learning right now.
My oldest are 12 and 15.
k12 is a failure (sorry Teachers’ Union).
Well, no, John. K-12 education is probably the most successful institution in South Dakota, despite the fact the funding levels never seem to match need.
Teachers have long complained about standardized testing, so I don’t know where your last sentence comes from. Teachers have long known that kids learn in different ways. Teachers have been making increasing efforts to reach all kids, which is more difficult as funding levels fail to fund smaller classrooms.
Standardized tests are a waste of time and money if the tests are too many/duplicative and the data are not used properly, which happens to be the case much of the time. They really can’t capture all the learning and talents kids have or engage in, but that’s not the point of these tests, so I don’t view that as a valid criticism.
There are plenty of standardized tests on computer science, by the way. I can’t figure out if your complaint means you want more standardized tests or fewer.
Donald Pay – “K-12 education is probably the most successful institution in South Dakota”
Relative to what education could be in the age of The Internet?
At the risk of making my kids the target of the teachers union and others, we home school.
At the risk of sounding harsh, the SD educational system exists as a foster entity while methed-out parents are overworked at the pleasure of the ruling class.
Families that stay together and learn together have better outcomes. It’s rare, but we are an example of the failure of opportunity of SD educational dollars. Our very existence is a threat to one of the biggest industries in SD – education.
I realize you want a pat on the back for home schooling. If it’s done well, I have no problem with home schooling.
I don’t view sitting kids down in front of a computer to be education. There’s a lot of good and a lot of just horrible stuff there, and kids, not to mention adults, can wander onto sites that push all sorts of lies and nonsense. There are some good internet curricula ought there, and schools do use some of the more reputable of those. I know that many kids do well with home schooling.
People who are paranoid of others, particularly their neighbors who happen to be teachers, firemen, policemen and others who might be members of unions probably are best not to enter society very often. Really, you have a very jaded view of the 95 percent of your neighbors who place their children’s education in the hands of professional teachers. I hardly think they are all “methed-out.”
I don’t think you represent more than a tiny sliver of the home school community, so I’m not going to do as you do and malign everyone who doesn’t follow my particular education preference. You should, though, curb your condescension and prejudice. You do home schooling no good by being so obnoxious.
“no good by being so obnoxious”
If there was a due process guide on when to call someone obnoxious justifiably, unduly calling somebody obnoxious would be one of the obnoxious things on the list.
Some things about me – I know my home school, my kids, I attended 12 schools for k-12 and have two degrees. My oldest home schooler could have passed most of the GED last year. She is 15. My 12 year old could pass it now, I reckon.
When I say the k-12 model has failed us, and that parents are abused in good faith knowing parental responsibility will be assumed by the school, I mean it.
This stupid bureaucratic system is obnoxious and it incentivizes its minions to label and slander people who oppose it.
You should be cheerleading people like me .. we will do our best to prevent the next great holocaust.
The public education system of the USA is what made us a great nation. Despite GOP efforts to destroy it, public education continues to provide great benefits individual families and the nation as a whole. It’s not perfect, but it’s certainly good.
Schools don’t assume parental responsibilities. The state Constitution 8-1 establishes the public school system:
§ 1. Uniform system of free public schools. The stability of a republican form of government depending on the morality and intelligence of the people, it shall be the duty of the Legislature to establish and maintain a general and uniform system of public schools wherein tuition shall be without charge, and equally open to all; and to adopt all suitable means to secure to the people the advantages and opportunities of education.
“…it shall be the duty of the Legislature….” is pretty strong language developed by the parents back in the 1880s. These parents recognized how important education was not only to “secure to the people the advantages and opportunities of education,” but to assure “the stability of a republican form of government.” There is nothing there about assuming parental responsibility, and schools legally can’t assume those responsibilities.
You’re discussing this with the guy who supported the first pilot project in a high school in South Dakota regarding independent study of students using the internet back in 2000. There are good and bad aspects of the internet in education, and we discovered both in our pilot project. We found that highly motivated students did fine, but some students missed the back and forth interaction in classroom discussion. I’m sure there have been good and bad developments in internet education since then, but I recall most students in that program welcomed a hybrid of independent work on the internet along with the normal classroom work they did.
Let’s also deal with the GED. I realize there have been some changes since I was tutoring some adults to get through the tests, but the GED is not very rigorous.
What is parental responsibility is not the subject of law .. it predates SD codified law most certainly.
I am not deriving “responsibility” in this context based on codified law or judicial precedent.
I am a bit taken back that you use law to try to justify this term; a symptom of the problem.
The parent delegates 100% of the responsibility for the child’s well being until such time as custody of the child can be reestablished by parents (after phone call, presumably).
In my view (I am citing my view), education, nourishment, medication, and discipline are parental responsibilities. These are delegated to the school system and its teachers.
The GED at 12 is much different than the GED at 16, 18, or 30.
It is a firm indictment of the school system that we were able to achieve this for a budget of around $20/year in educational supplies and services.
Sorry, we are a nation of laws, not of men. You beat your child, you go to jail (or ought to), and lose parental rights. That’s the way life works here in America.
Your view of your responsibilities is reasonable, assuming how that parent went about implementing those responsibilities reasonably and in accordance with the law. I think you would agree with me that no one should use those parental responsibilities in a way that harms a child. For example, someone may say that they are going to stick a 3-year-old in a closet without food or water until they learn to read Shakespeare. That, I assume, would not meet your idea of parental responsibility. Or would it?
As a society, we have laws and regulations that govern parental responsibilities, and agencies that intervene when those aren’t carried out. For example, home schooling is loosely regulated, but as a school board member I had to vote, as required by law, to release home schooled students from attendance. If a student was not released by the school board, that student would be considered truant, and parents could be in trouble with the law.
Most parents think it is their parental responsibility to see that their kids attend school. Don’t think your are superior because they made a choice you didn’t.
In South Dakota the law says a parent can spank (beat) their children to get them to comply with reasonable requests.
“we have laws and regulations that govern parental responsibilities”
I’m saddened that this is the prevailing wisdom. Most normal parents have a duty, a core value that transcends the law. Yet, it’s the laws that compel them to service the needs of others unwillingly in return for compensation that does not provide in the present economy. Upward mobility is a myth succumbed to greed, but the logic of not having a minimum wage is sound.
Home schooling and taking responsibility for one’s own children in this servitude economy is a great sacrifice, but it should be rewarded handsomely.
Sen Bolin needs to do his homework. He states there is no connection between the current standardized test used in SD and higher ed. . . High School students who score proficient on the standardized test receive AUTOMATIC entrance into any SD BOR or Tech school, no ACT needed, no questions asked. In fact, that has been the case for two years. Families of students who score proficient receive an automatic enrollment notification letter. Can we assume that Sen Bolin’s children are beyond HS age, or are we to assume that no students in Canton can score proficient and receive automatic enrollment? DO YOUR RESEARCH, SEN BOLIN!
John, You can be saddened all you want by laws, but your sadness and the reality that some kids face are not comparable. We don’t have laws for the people who exhibit duty and core values. We have laws for people who don’t, or whose anger or drug use or mental issues make them incapable of properly caring for their child. No one is going to be hauled in for swatting a toddler’s bottom, though that form of discipline is really not the best. But if that swat becomes a beating, that’s a different matter altogether, and your sadness about laws over this means nothing compared to that child’s physical and emotional pain. So, my advice is to stop wallowing in your own fake sadness, and start feeling something for those children.
We need to rethink the entire process of education .. starting with nutrition an the seat of consciousness.
Donald Pay – nuance.
I’m not saddened by the laws per se, but rather that they have been engineered to create and (attempt) to solve the problems.
No offense, but your comments come off as y self righteous.
We have taken full responsibility for our children; education, nutrition, ethics, citizenship, and the list goes on.
This is rare, and most certainly uncompensated commensurate with the risk, difficulty, and importance of the job.
Families like mine are under constant slow moving attack. Do I seem like I’m wallowing to you?
What do you think you actually know about my family above what I have written about publicly?
How is the order of your own house? Good?
“Save the children” – okay. I’ll start with mine .. from the deep state and the dastardly notion that laws on paper are a substitute for the depth of true natural parental responsibility.
Yes, John, you seem to be in a constant state of self-pity and want to blame someone for whatever problems you imagine you are having. Your constant trope about the “deep state” is a pretty clear give away. But you are in a lot of company there.
You seem to think what you do for your children is somehow “rare,” as if what others do for their children, though it might be slightly different from you, is somehow far lesser than what you do. Don’t you see how self-righteous you are?
And the “uncompensated” word comes up a lot in your posts. It seems that really bothers you. I always thought that part of being a parent was you didn’t expect monetary compensation for that. You seem to want a pat on the back for doing what every other parent in the world does. You may think you are special and put yourself up on a pedestal and expect us all to praise you, but most of us are too busy raising our children for that.
And, again, you have to draw attention to yourself and your wallowing by saying “families like mine are under constant slow motion attack.” Hey, I can’t think of one family that hasn’t thought that from time to time. Get over yourself, stop blaming the fictional “deep state,” start dealing with your real issues, and join others in trying to make things better. As long as you are wallowing in self-pity, you aren’t doing yourself or your children any good.
John, I am glad that you have the ability and capacity to homeschool your children. What I think you leave out of the discussion of public education, is that not all families have that capacity; some students have special needs that transcend the ability of parents to fully educate.
To that end, I support public education as an institution. Even though my own children are now out of the school system, I support public education as a need for my community. I have to reject part of your underlying assumption, that education is a ONLY parent responsibility for their children; certainly that responsibility exists, but it is too small in focus. Public education is for the public good. We have local elected school boards to ensure that public, yet local, focus.
I do not see homeschooling as “under attack.” I do see that your decision to home school does not forgive you of the social obligation to do your part for the continuation of strong public schools. In the same way that families who choose private schools or even families who have no children in the public school system, the obligation is one to the community. That comes off as a bit socialist, but I do not think we ever need to apologize for doing things for a public good — to help raise up others.
I’m sorry, Cory, that I got pulled into john Dale’s dysfunction. I generally stay away from pulling threads too far away from the original topic.
Back on the topic, I think a look at standardized tests deserves some legislative time, but I’d prefer if it were a serious look, not the usual quick look with a pet bill already in hand. How much classroom time is lost due to administrating the tests? How much prep time is spent in the classroom getting ready for the tests? How many tests are administered per year, for how much time each? What is the purpose of the tests? How are data used by teachers, by students, by administrators, by state officials? Are these tests required or helpful in order to justify certain federal/state/private funds or grants? Are the test used for student evaluations? Can data be disaggregated to be more useful, or is the test vendor not willing to do that?
Legislators tend to skim over an issue, and not fully understand it before they dive in with a bill. With something like this, they ought to deal with it in a serious way.
I am not in favor of a completely standardized education ..
When people are allowed to pursue their passion and match themselves to need in the market, it creates the kind of dynamism that leads to an efficient free market.
When kids are forced into a mold by the education system, which gobbles-up a huge chunk of assets with no way of measuring the results (pseudo-nihilism alert), you get communism and stagnation of human culture and a civil war of the human spirit.
Lastly, I envision people in 1920’s Germany being told, “it’s the choice you made to resist” at the gallows.
“Those are just the choices you have made” is an excuse by the ruling class to avoid responsibility to create/share opportunity that comes with possession of resources and vision.
The paradox – or more accurately the fallacy of reasoning – is that correct choices are always rewarded.
It is the responsibility, in some regard, of our culture to make sure that merit is rewarded. When it is not rewarded, the culture and society both break down, in that order.
Our culture and society, for the time being, are broken.
Most federal American federal institutions can be summed-up in 5 words.
“The emperor wears no clothes.”
Don, I think of my experience in public schools. As a student, we had 2 different standardized tests. There was an IQ test in 3rd grade and the Iowa Basic Skills Tests. I graduated high school in 1971, all schooling in Hand County.
As a teacher, all in SD, at 2 different schools, 1976-82, I don’t recall any standardized tests for the grades I taught, 7-12 in small towns.
We teachers knew exactly what our students needed, what their strengths and weaknesses were, where they needed help, etc. I can’t say the same for bigger schools because I just don’t know.
We didn’t have a need for standardized tests because we had the generational wisdom of teachers for guidance. Even as a first year teacher, there were veterans twice or 3 times my age who knew where students should be, what techniques worked to get them there, methods of instruction that resonated with different abilities and so forth.
The schools would be fine if the GOP would stop attacking them and demeaning teachers, fully fully fully fund schools, give them support respect, pay teachers commensurate with the value they bring, believe believe believe them, trust trust trust them and let teachers teach.
Debbo,
I pretty much agree with you. I took Iowa Basics, too. I think it was every years in Sioux Falls’ elementary schools, but I may be wrong. Also agree regarding teachers.
I think standardized tests, because they test all students on the same material, can be helpful. They helped me tease out some actual proof about how mobility affects learning. Also, helped in pinpointing which students weren’t being served well as they transitioned from middle school to high school. I can see the usefulness of standardized tests if the data is actually used by parents, students, teachers and districts to find and correct deficiencies, not to punish, humiliate or otherwise demean students, teachers, schools or districts. To do that standardized test data have to by designed to tease out and test hypotheses, not to get some grade for a school or district.
Your information about generational knowledge in a school is important. I saw that in my daughter’s school and that school had a tremendous amount of mobility. Veteran teachers are very important, which is why it’s not just beginning salaries for new teachers that are important. Sometimes, though, that generational knowledge may not bubble up to the district level, especially in larger districts.
The push for more standardized testing had two purposes (disguised in sheep’s clothing):
1) undermine public education – testing scores were used to drive a narrative of “failing” schools.
2) undermine teachers – trust the scores not the professionals trained to evaluate students.
for-profit reformers pushed open the door to profit on public education – either through testing, reform, or take over.
The one reservation I would make is that these scores did reveal some crucial date for the underperformance of poor and of-color students that had been swept under the rug to that point. Equity discussions finally had some date to move forward – but even then were too often ignored.
I agree with both Donald and O about the value that can be found in standardized testing.
Legislators, are you listening?
Since we’ve implemented standardized testing, the gap between US student performance and other countries has widened.
I worked at Pearson. The tests are weaponized and meant to hobble our students and prevent their success while parents are “kept busy” with meaningless jobs that do not embody core American values of innovation, progress, and risk.
I have a model for schools that will work much better .. I’d like to share this with someone from SD Education.
It’s the model for the future, it is very cost effective, it uses teachers to their potential, and it keeps families together.
If kids are the most important natural resource in our country, why are parents not compensated for doing a good job raising them while we send billions of dollars to Iran?
“The push for more standardized testing had two purposes (disguised in sheep’s clothing):
1) undermine public education – testing scores were used to drive a narrative of “failing” schools.
2) undermine teachers – trust the scores not the professionals trained to evaluate students.”
o!!!!!!!
:D
You have this 100% correct.
I was working in technology for Pearson in 2001. They were absolutely taking-over the US education system with NCS4School.
I left the company when, after they had forced American IT engineers to train their replacements, they let the entire US staff of National Computer Systems (an acquisition) go.
THIS WAS MY FIRST GLIMPSE OF THE FORM OF MODERN WARFARE WAGED BY COWARDS AFRAID OF OUR MILITARY.