Monday, April 23, 2012

David Brooks Can Suck It

Ah, the New York Times' David Brooks opens his big stupid mouth with yet another pronouncement about higher ed, to wit: Since Bush-era NCLB high stakes testing is working so well in primary and secondary ed, we should have it in college, too. Let's hear it for draconian one-size-fits-all reform!

I can't even begin to express how fucking stupid this idea is. God help us all if it gains traction.

For a nice rebuttal in the Crampicle, read Laurie Essig's post.

Since we're not really about nice rebuttals here in the THUNDERDOME CM, feel free to let fly in the comments. I look forward to hearing what y'all think--unfiltered.


12 comments:

  1. Because it's bedtime and I don't want to raise my blood pressure, I read Essig's rebuttal instead of Brooks' original (yes, I know this is less than entirely responsible. You may dock my grade accordingly). On that basis, I have two comments:

    --I thought *I* was "academe's Cassandra." Now what? Do I have to challenge Brooks (or Essig) to a duel? At the very least, I'm feeling Strelnikov's pain.

    --Harvard (and other highly-regarded private universities) will simply opt out of any such system, as, as far as I know, most private and parochial schools opt out of NCLB. Or, if forced to participate by threatened withdrawal of federal funds, they'll simply band together and make use of alumni participation and/or pressure to make sure the test is one on which their graduates will do well (which won't be hard, since they already select students in part on the basis of success in other fairly high-level standardized tests -- e.g. APs and IBs -- and can always move further in that direction if they choose. After all, they have their pick of the strongest students in the country, and it shows in their admission rates -- a little over 7% (!) for Princeton this year).

    --As I've said before, I do think that certain basic skills that should improve over the course of college (reading comprehension of complex texts, numerical/statistical literacy) can be measured via multiple choice. But any worthwhile test would also have to measure students' ability to *produce* and *present* well-supported analytical arguments of their own (and appropriate to their majors), preferably under conditions controlled enough to assure that they really did the work themselves. That work would then need to be assessed by people who genuinely knew what they were doing -- i.e. Ph.D.s who are current in their fields. That would be prohibitively expensive. Before we do that, why don't we just hire those same Ph.D.s at a living wage to teach and assess *within* college classes, and restore conditions (i.e. tenure and other systems of reward that don't overvalue the short-term happiness of students) that allow them to grade strictly and fairly? If any of this is to work, the students *have* to have considerable skin in the game, the simplest way to accomplish that is to make their graduations contingent on successful completion of the assessment instrument, and the simplest way to accomplish that is to make the assessment instruments the ones we already administer: exams, papers, and the like.

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    1. Hmm. . .that's three comments, isn't it? As I said, it's bedtime. (Also, though I passed my undergrad institution's required numerical/statistical literacy test, I don't seem to have retained some of the basics from, say, nursery school).

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  2. From the comments on Brooks' column: The reason students aren't learning is not the colleges fault, it's the students fault. Most students don't know why they are there, they go to college because its what they are "supposed to do". They have no end goal and no real desire to learn. College has become just another high school, filled with students who don't care to learn, and only want to take the easiest classes so they have time to party.

    Sounds about right. Generally there needs to be more willingness to be hard-ass among our colleagues and admins; students aren't being told they need to bring it or get out, and it shows.

    I am still shaking my head over a colleague, for whom I have lost all respect, who gives nothing but A grades in his classes because he doesn't believe in grading.

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    1. That said, of course, there's a question as to whether my institution (or a number of others) could survive if we actually started upholding serious standards for our students. No tuition, no salary, no roof over my head or food on the table.

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  3. Ditto, CC. I only read Essig. But I mistakenly turned to the comments section, thinking it's like this place. Big mistake: it's full of right-wing trolls who seem to hate higher ed.

    My $0.02: the geniuses who turned both Wall Street and American secondary schools into the successes that they are want to do the same to higher ed. There's big money there. Just not for actually educating students.

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  4. I'm still gobsmacked at the idea that there is anyone who thinks that NCLB has been anything other than a complete and unmitigated disaster. If I lived in the US my children would be in private school now.

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    1. Right??? I don't understand how anyone with any inkling of a brain considers NCLB a success in any way.

      Accountability isn't limited to assessment.

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  5. To quote a phenomenal interview with an educator from a country where their education system actually works - Finland - "accountability is what's left when responsibility has been taken away." Accountability is punitive; responsibility is proactive. Accountability forces teaching to the test or you'll get thumped. Responsibility leaves it in the teacher's hands how to make sure their students understand what they need to cope with the next stage in the curriculum, and helps them with the resources do do that. But why treat teachers like adults? Why not treat them like lazy, naughty children who need to be beaten into submission? Since that approach is clearly working SO WELL.

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  6. And while we're here, after all, every single problem any student ever has is solely the fault of the lazy useless teachers. Income disparity in student backgrounds has NO EFFECT AT ALL. /sweeps 1000 studies proving the opposite under the rug /

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  7. I'm all confused. This isn't the NFL, but it is the Thunderdome?

    I wouldn't take this too seriously. As you observe, David Brooks is a smeghead.

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    1. Frod, I'm being almost totally facetious. Sometimes, when we start smacking each other instead of *them* (whoever they are), it feels like the Thunderdome.

      The problem is that smeghead ideas get airplay in this country.

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    2. Yeah I know, disco was a bad one.

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