Of high-stakes standardized testing and educational inequities for English Learners: In dialogue with Wayne Au (original) (raw)
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The scholarly literature regarding standardized testing in the United States since the implementation of No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top has been nearly unanimous in its condemnation of the effects of these tests. This article specifically analyses the multifold ways that standardized testing disadvantages students of colour and students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. The stated policy objectives of No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top are to decrease disparities in educational achievement nationwide. However, study after study demonstrate widening chasms in educational achievement, shrinking and standardization of the curriculum, along with the elimination of effective teaching methods. Standardized testing as introduced by these legislative acts nevertheless continues unabated. Because of this contradiction, it is argued, using Henry and Tator’s theory of democratic racism, that the goals of these programs and their concomitant standardized testing are actually meant to maintain the status quo and in fact increase the power of dominant groups and ruling elites.
This qualitative research examines what new measures, steps, and initiatives have been done to improve the effect of standardized testing on test scores and the quality of schooling in public education today. It is aimed by surveying and interviewing undergraduate students at the University of California, Los Angeles to compare and contrast the different types of views and opinions on standardized testing. The study is only based on undergraduate students who attend UCLA and no other subjects outside of that area. This study assumes that many undergraduate students at UCLA believe that standardized testing in the twenty-first century has not provided any information about what we want to know about student achievement. Furthermore, it also assumes that standardized testing is to blame for the lack of minority students enrolling and attending UCLA this upcoming academic year. In addition, this paper provides an in-depth investigation among the racial boundaries and barriers that persist in standardized testing while expressing the assumptions, expectations, and perceived realities that are discussed in media depictions and popular culture on school desegregation today. To a larger extent, this research introduces the concept and theoretical framework of systematic racial intervention to denote teachers and parent actions on promoting positive race relations in classroom while increasing academic awareness, instruction, and curriculum. This paper concludes by arguing that it is not only best for teachers and parents to have some sort of power or right to develop assessment reform plans, but also have some sort of legal authority to which types of class a student can place themselves in surrounding the implications of race and desegregation today.
Understanding the Interaction between High-stakes Graduation Tests and English Language Learners
Teachers College Record, 2011
Background/Context: The prevailing theory of action underlying No Child Left Behind’s high-stakes testing and accountability ratings is that schools and students held accountable to these measures will automatically increase educational output as educators try harder, schools will adopt more effective methods, and students will learn more. In Texas, the centerpiece of high school accountability is the pressure to improve exit test scores, a battery of minimum competency exams that students have to pass to graduate from high school. Despite the theory underlying accountability, it is unknown whether policies that reward and sanction schools and students based on high-stakes tests improve English learner (EL) student outcomes over the long term. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study: The purpose of the research is to better understand the interaction between high-stakes testing, accountability, and ELs. This study asks the following questions: Have student outcomes for ELs improved since the inception of accountability in Texas? To what extent does social capital theory inform our understanding of the impact of high-stakes exit testing on EL exit test performance in Texas high schools? What are the perceptions of teachers, principals, and students regarding the effects of high-stakes testing and accountability on ELs? Research Design: This article reviews longitudinal student outcomes (test scores, dropout, grade retention, and graduation rates) for Texas ELs from the inception of accountability in 1993. To understand the interaction between ELs and high-stakes exams, the researcher undertook qualitative field work in high schools in four Texas districts with large numbers of ELs to understand how the life contexts of ELs interact with Texas-style high-stakes testing and accountability policies. Via administrator, teacher, and student perceptions of exit testing, the article attempts to shed light on the academic challenges faced by ELs in the current accountability context. Conclusions/Recommendations: This article underscores the legitimacy of the concern that ELs experience unintended consequences associated with high-stakes exit testing and accountability policy and suggests that social justice and equity are ratiocinative critiques of high-stakes testing and accountability policies. The next round of federal and state educational policy must be a mandate that provides support for ELs to meet performance standards by providing evidence-based solutions: appropriate curriculum, pedagogy, and well-trained teachers. Furthermore, policy makers, practitioners, and researchers should be cognizant of the less intrusive approach that many ELs and their families have toward schools by reconsidering whether “one size fits all” high-stakes exit testing policies are plausible for increasingly heterogeneous student populations. The use of multiple measures of EL student success in content areas, such as portfolios, is an accountability mechanism that makes sense, not just for ELs, but for all students. English learners (ELs) constitute a large sector of students vulnerable to poor school performance because many of these youth arrive having received uneven or irregular instruction in their home countries (Olsen, 1997). ELs exhibit low academic achievement, poor performance on standardized exams, low graduation rates, and high dropout rates (Gándara, Rumberger, Maxwell-Jolly, & Callahan, 2003). ELs often do not receive specialized instruction in the classroom (August & Hakuta, 1997), leading to a “failure” track that can be exacerbated by fast-tracked standardized testing in English . National achievement trends are also reflected in aggregate Texas data. U.S. Census Bureau (2008) data show that Texas ranks second nationally in its percentage of immigrant Latinos aged 25 years and older without a high school diploma. Valenzuela, Fuller, and Vasquez Heilig (2006) found that the disappearance of ELs from Texas schools is twice the rate of other students. Valencia and Villarreal (2004) showed that Texas ELs have dramatically lagged behind English-proficient students on the state-mandated Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS). Vasquez Heilig and Darling-Hammond (2008) found that less than a quarter of ELs were graduating from a large urban school district in Texas. Hence, the twin problems of lagging achievement and low completion rates are problematic for ELs in Texas.
English learners left behind: Standardized testing as language policy
2008
Learners Left Behind: Standardized Testing as Language Policy is an illuminating work that addresses a topic which until now has had little attention: the effect of the federal education policy of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) on the lives of English Language Learners (ELLs) in terms of their educational experiences, particularly their language learning experiences, in the U.S. public school system. Using a mixed qualitative and quantitative research design, Menken provides data from interviews, observations, state, district, and school policy documents, standardized test results, and other sources (i.e., graduation and drop out rates) to illustrate how ELLs in ten high schools across the boroughs of New York City experience extraordinarily high failure rates on the high-stakes graduation exit exams (in English) that they must pass in order to receive a high school diploma and/or be admitted to college. In short, Menken convincingly illustrates that the standardized testing required by NCLB ". .. is in actuality a language policy, even though this is rarely discussed and nor is the law presented to the public as such" (p. 5).
The Inequitable Treatment of English Learners in California's Public Schools - eScholarship
2002
UCLA/IDEA UCLA's Institute for Democracy, Education, & Access www.ucla-idea.org Williams Watch Series-Gándara & Rumberger wws-rr005-1002 ____________________________________ UCLA/IDEA www.ucla-idea.org 1 English learners comprise one-fourth of the entire public school population in California, and one out of three students in the elementary grades (Rumberger & Gándara, 2000, Table 1). In total, they represent nearly 1.5 million students. Of these, the largest percentage-approximately 80 percent-speak Spanish and 88 percent of the students speak one of four major languages. There are very few California schools that report having no English learners among their student population. Today, the typical California school is composed of both English learners and English speakers, and in many schools more than one-quarter of the student body is not fluent in English. Although most English learners are found at the elementary school level, a larger proportion of English learners (hereafter also referred to as ELs or EL students) is found in secondary schools than commonly believed. One-third of elementary students are ELs, but more than 18 percent of secondary school students are also English learners (Rumberger & Gándara, 2000, Table 1). Proportionately, the number of English learners in secondary schools has been growing at a faster rate than the number in elementary schools (California Department of Education, Language Census 2001). The increase in the population of these secondary level English learners presents a particular challenge for both the students and the schools that serve them. This is principally because older children have less time to acquire both English and academic skills in order to get ready for high school graduation and to prepare for post-Williams Watch Series-Gándara & Rumberger wws-rr005-1002 Williams Watch Series-Gándara & Rumberger wws-rr005-1002 ____________________________________ UCLA/IDEA www.ucla-idea.org 4 60859). The need for improving the education provided by California's high schools is undeniable. Although accountability measures may be necessary to this effort, there is early evidence that the HSEE presents exceptionally high stakes for EL students. By the end of their sophomore year, students from the class of 2004 had been given two opportunities to pass the HSEE. Thus far, the majority of EL students have yet to pass the exam. Whereas 48 percent of all students had passed the exam by the end of their sophomore year, only 19 percent of English learners had passed the exam (California Department of Education, 2002, Attachment 1). Stanford 9 Between the years 1998 and 2001, the State used the SAT9-a norm-referenced, Englishonly achievement test-as the only metric by which to track the academic performance of all of its students, including English learners, who by definition, do not understand the test well enough to make it a valid form of assessment. 1 Given that the state has committed itself to the view that the SAT9 should be used across language groups, it ought to be concerned with cross-language group achievement comparisons. Therefore, in spite of the fact that we disagree with the State's judgment in this use of the test, we provide an analysis of the achievement of English learners vis-à-vis their English-speaking peers. A persistent gap in test scores is a major factor in the school experience of English learners. As a group they continue to perform more poorly than English-speaking students throughout their entire school careers. This is clearly illustrated by the SAT9 English reading scores across grade levels (see Figure 1). As expected, English learners who, by definition, are Williams Watch Series-Gándara & Rumberger wws-rr005-1002 ____________________________________ UCLA/IDEA www.ucla-idea.org 6 Even though the previous analysis shows a sizeable and growing achievement gap between English origin and non-English origin students across grade levels, there are some suggestions in the data that the gap has narrowed slightly. To investigate this issue, we examined SAT9 reading test scale scores between the years 1998 and 2001 compiled by Parrish et al. (2002) as part of their year two evaluation of Proposition 227. Scale scores show growth in achievement over time based on a common metric. Thus it provides a good indication of the amount of learning that has taken place over time. The evaluation team had access to individual student test scores for all the students in California for the years 1998 through 2001 by language classification. 2 The evaluation team examined changes in test scores between 1998 and 2001 for each grade level and for three synthetic cohorts of students: 3 (1) a cohort of students who were enrolled in grade 2 in 1998,
Standardized Test and The Impact on Latino Students
2018
This research reports on what Standardized Test are telling us about the type of education students of color are receiving and how it impacts them and the schools they attend. The method of analysis for this research relies on multiple peer reviewed articles and journals to draw conclusions on the impact of standardized testing. Upon examining the data, it has become clear that standardized testing indicate students of color are not getting the quality of education that their white counter parts are receiving. Standardized testing has clearly shown the education gap which has minimized future educational opportunities due to the reduction of federal funds to schools with predominantly minority population.