If Your Evidence Is Changes In Proficiency Rates, You Probably Don't Have Much Evidence

Matthew DiCarlo:

Education policymaking and debates are under constant threat from an improbable assailant: Short-term changes in cross-sectional proficiency rates.

The use of rate changes is still proliferating rapidly at all levels of our education system. These measures, which play an important role in the provisions of No Child Left Behind, are already prominent components of many states' core accountability systems (e..g, California), while several others will be using some version of them in their new, high-stakes school/district "grading systems." New York State is awarding millions in competitive grants, with almost half the criteria based on rate changes. District consultants issue reports recommending widespread school closures and reconstitutions based on these measures. And, most recently, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan used proficiency rate increases as "preliminary evidence" supporting the School Improvement Grants program.

Meanwhile, on the public discourse front, district officials and other national leaders use rate changes to "prove" that their preferred reforms are working (or are needed), while their critics argue the opposite. Similarly, entire charter school sectors are judged, up or down, by whether their raw, unadjusted rates increase or decrease.

Posted by Jim Zellmer at March 25, 2012 2:08 AM
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