I am a fan of Yong Zhao who just came out with a new book titled, Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Dragon: Why China has the Best (and Worst) Education System in the World, that is already getting rave reviews as a good, critical text on standardized testing in China and the impact that it's having on creativity and innovation—let alone mindsets that acquiesce to authoritarian rule. Here is his post on the matter that he links up to the Atlanta and El Paso cheating scandals and beyond:
High-stakes testing is America’s Faustian bargain, made with the
devil of authoritarianism. Under the rule of authoritarianism, which
gave birth to high-stakes testing in the first place, disrespect of
teachers as professional colleagues and intrusion into their
professional autonomy are praised as characteristics of no-nonsense,
tough leadership with high expectations.
Those of us here in Texas that have been fighting high-stakes testing since the beginning are well aware of this authoritarianism that is actually also conveniently related to the right's intention to ration opportunity here in Texas and to underfund public education in great part because of their unwillingness to educate to a high level a growing Latino demographic. That this system is additionally profitable to the testing, tutoring, and test-prep-material private sector and the corporatization and privatization agenda related to it through the shaming and blaming of public schools, is an added—indeed, lucrative—bonus.
To use Michael Apple's term, the "authoritarian populists," like the skills that public schools provide, but they do have issues with a curriculum like Mexican American Studies (and Black and Native American Studies) that they not only see as inferior, but also as a political capitulation to a community that when educated well, threatens the incumbencies of those in power. Let no one fool you, a long history of under- and mis-education is part and parcel to the curtailing, and denial, of the franchise. This is of course coupled with a new Voter ID law that the U.S. Supreme Court recently ruled on that stands to disenfranchise 600,000 voters
in the November 4, 2014 elections. This law was passed in the Texas Legislature under the rationale of wanting to address voter fraud even though evidence to this effect was never proffered. None of this was lost on folks here in Texas keeping tabs on this. Check out this helpful Christian Science Monitor piece on Voter ID here in Texas.
Stated differently, the first Faustian bargain was to accede to the systematic underfunding of public education at all levels because after all, to cite Lisa Delpit, these were (and are) "other people's children" for whom a deep investment must seem "dissonant" for those in power wanting to preserve the status quo.
Implications for China? A similar rationing of opportunity and ultimately, a mitigation of any expectation that our schools actually can be not only sites of innovation and creativity, but also vehicles for the democratic impulse of education for liberation and emancipation.
-Angela
P.S. Readers of this blog, remember to vote in the Nov. 4th elections. And vote in candidates that both oppose high-stakes testing and are known supporters of public education.
Fatal Attraction: America’s Suicidal Quest for Educational Excellence
by
Creative, Entrepreneurial, and Global: 21st Century Education
13 September 2014
[This is the introduction to my latest book
Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Dragon: Why China has the Best (and Worst) Education System in the World published by Jossey-Bass in September 2014. Also available on
Amazon and
Barnes & Noble.]
In 2009 Dr. Beverly Hall, former superintendent of the Atlanta Public
Schools, was named America’s National Superintendent of the Year for
“representing the ‘best of the best’ in public school leadership.”
[1]
Hall was hosted in the White House by Secretary of Education Arne
Duncan. In 2010, the American Educational Research Association honored
her with its Distinguished Community Service Award, which “recognizes
exceptional contributions to advancing the use of education research and
statistics.”
[2] Also in 2010, President Obama appointed Hall to the elite National Board for Education Sciences.
In 2013, Hall was indicted by a grand jury in Georgia for “violation
of Racketeer Influence and Corrupt Organizations Act, false statements
and writings, false swearing, and theft by taking.”
[3]
The Racketeer Influence and Corrupt Organization Act is a law typically
used against Mafia leaders. If she is convicted, Hall faces 45 years in
prison.
What made Hall a national hero is precisely what brought about her downfall.
She earned national recognition by significantly improving tests scores
in the Atlanta Public Schools, one of America’s largest urban school
districts, and one with a large proportion of minority students. These
higher test scores, as it turned out, were not the result of improved
student learning, but rather, of a conspiracy of teachers and school
leaders. Together with Hall, 34 top administrators, principals, and
teachers in Atlanta were indicted for “improving” student test results
through cheating. And the total number of individuals involved in the
scandal was even larger: Some 178 principals and teachers at nearly half
of Atlanta’s schools were reportedly in on the scam.
The case of Beverly Hall is just one of many unfolding national
scandals in the United States. Celebrated heroes have been graced with
honorary titles and rewarded generous cash bonuses for dramatically
improving test scores—then exposed for “cooking the books.”
In 2012, Lorenzo Garcia, former superintendent of the El Paso
Independent School District in Texas, was sentenced to three and a half
years in prison for “improving” his schools by preventing low-performing
students from taking the state test. Garcia had twice been nominated
for Texas Superintendent of the Year.
Michelle Rhee, former chancellor of the Washington, D.C., public
schools, was implicated in cheating scandals soon after the district’s
dramatic improvement sent her to national stardom—with a prominent spot
in the influential documentary
Waiting for Superman, on the covers of
Time and
Newsweek, and backed with millions of dollars for her new organization StudentsFirst.
Cheating scandals have been discovered in almost every major school
district that has reported great improvements: Houston, Los Angeles,
Philadelphia, and New York
[4].
The most obvious victims are the hundreds of thousands of innocent
children directly affected by the unethical, immoral, and illegal
activities of the adults working in their school systems. But millions
more are affected. What about those students, teachers, and school
leaders who did
not cheat and were adversely affected by their
lower test scores? Even the instigators of these cheating scandals are
victims, in a sense. Sure, they may have been driven by greed for the
cash prizes and promotions associated with improved test scores (or by
the desire to avoid punishment for reporting poor test scores). But it’s
unlikely that these people entered the education profession intending
to hurt children for their own gains.
The villain behind these cheating scandals is the accountability system itself, which is based on high-stakes testing. Ushered
in by President George W. Bush’s No Child Left Behind Act in 2001 and
reinforced by President Barack Obama’s Race to the Top initiative in
2009, test-based accountability that directly links student performance
to educators’ livelihood has become the yardstick of American education.
By attaching lavish rewards and harsh punishment to student test
scores, the system provides powerful incentives for cheating. Educators
have far less control over student performance—and far less impact on
its quality—than policy makers presume. And that’s especially true for
teachers working in impoverished communities.
When it comes to the harm done by high-stakes testing, rampant
cheating is just the tip of the iceberg. As Sharon Nichols and David
Berliner point out in their book
Collateral Damage: How High-Stakes Testing Corrupts America’s Schools
[1], this “cooking of the books” is but one of many damages done by
testing reported by parents, teachers, and researchers. Education
historian Diane Ravitch warns in her book,
The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education[2], that high stakes testing is one of the many symptoms of a virus threatening America’s future.
That virus is the rising tide of authoritarianism in the United States.
In exchange for the comfort of knowing how their children are doing
academically and that their schools are being held accountable,
Americans welcomed high-stakes testing into public education. Without
the benefit of historical experience with these kinds of high-stakes
tests, however, Americans failed to recognize those benign-looking tests
as a Trojan horse—with a dangerous ghost inside. That ghost,
authoritarianism, sees education as a way to instill in all students the
same knowledge and skills deemed valuable by the authority.
Despite cheating scandals and stressed-out students, America doesn’t
seem ready to be rid of its villain. Many Americans still believe
standardized tests are needed, and that problems like widespread
cheating can be fixed through superficial means. Since the cheating
scandals went public, most of the attention has gone to the crimes
committed by a few individuals and technical fixes that would have
prevented them—everything from prescribing more severe punishments to
increasing testing security and inventing better tests. Political
leaders have pushed aside the call to abandon high-stakes testing
altogether. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said that while he was
“stunned” by the Atlanta cheating scandal, the problem “is an easy one
to fix, with better test security.”
[5]
Most parents support standardized testing and the use of test scores in
teacher evaluation. Even some educators and school leaders support
standardized testing. The two largest education unions, the American
Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association, both
accept standardized testing as part of American education.
Herein lies the tragedy for America—and reason for my writing this book.
The tale told by Chinese education illustrates the full range of
tragic events that can happen under authoritarian rule. As one of the
perfect incarnations of authoritarian education, China has produced
superior test takers who have maintained a great civilization for
millennia–but have failed to cultivate talents to defend against Western
aggressions backed by modern technology and sciences in the 1800s.
Since then China has struggled to retreat from its tradition of
authoritarian education. Although China has already benefited from a
gradual withdrawal from central dictation, as evidenced by its recent
miraculous economic growth, authoritarianism still rules.
Technical fixes won’t stop the damage and embarrassment of cheating scandals. Reducing the
amount
of high-stakes standardized testing does little to limit its
destructive influence. The damage done by authoritarianism is far
greater than the instructional time taken away by testing, the narrowed
educational experiences for students, and the demoralization of
teachers. The deeper tragedy is the loss of values traditionally
celebrated by American education—values that that helped make America
the most prosperous and advanced nation in the world. Erase those
values, and you lose the creative power of a culture that celebrates
diversity and respects individuality. You also lose the time, resources,
and opportunities you need if you are to invent a new education that
will continue to lead the world.
High-stakes testing is America’s Faustian bargain, made with
the devil of authoritarianism. Under the rule of authoritarianism, which
gave birth to high-stakes testing in the first place, disrespect of
teachers as professional colleagues and intrusion into their
professional autonomy are praised as characteristics of no-nonsense,
tough leadership with high expectations. Beverly Hall became
national Superintendent of the Year for having “demonstrated a
commitment to setting high standards for students and school personnel.”
[6] That commitment turned out to be authoritarian rule, as a 2012
New York Times report
[7]
points out: “For years, Beverly L. Hall, the former school
superintendent here [Atlanta schools], ruled by fear. Principals were
told that if state test scores did not go up enough, they would be
fired—and 90 percent of them were removed in the decade of Dr. Hall’s
reign.
“Underlings were humiliated during rallies at the Georgia Dome,” to set an example of Hall’s “rule by fear,” the
New York Times
report continues. “Dr. Hall permitted principals with the highest test
scores to sit up front near her, while sticking those with the lowest
scores off to the side, in the bleachers.” Moreover, “she was
chauffeured around the city, often with an entourage of aides and
security guards. When she spoke publicly, questions had to be submitted
beforehand for screening.”
Lorenzo Garcia, the former El Paso superintendent, was another
action-oriented leader praised for his miracles. He kept almost half of
students eligible for 10
th grade from taking the 10
th grade exam by not allowing them to enroll in the school, retaining them at 9
th grade, or rushing them into 11
th
grade.
Although what he did was reported and investigated by both the
U.S. Department of Education and the Texas Education Agency, twice, he
got away “because he held people’s careers in his hands . . . If you
said no to him, you were gone,” said El Paso director of student
services Mark Emmanuel Mendoza on NPR
[8].
El Paso has a large population of Mexican immigrants, and Garcia also
exploited the community’s fear of the courts, fear of Border Patrol and
trust in the school system. The students excluded from the 10
th-grade
exam “were made to feel like they did something wrong,” said Linda
Romero, the drop-out prevention counselor who blew the whistle
[9].
Under the spell of authoritarianism, the Obama administration has
consistently disregarded the law, not to mention the checks and balances
of American democracy. Instead of reworking the expired No Child Left
Behind Act, President Obama and his Secretary of Education have given
out waivers to states, exempting them from the law in exchange for their
willingness to accept the administration’s wishes. States have
responded favorably, and Congress has largely forgiven, if not condoned,
the administrations’ actions.
Under the spell of authoritarianism, 50 million American children are being taught a
de facto national curriculum, then subjected to a
de facto national
standardized test. The Common Core State Standards Initiative, created
with little input from the people or their representatives, is now
enforced with tax dollars in nearly all states. Although the federal
government did not technically pay for its development or officially
adopt its standards, the billions of dollars in the Race to the Top
program—which required the adoption of common standards and
assessment—undoubtedly helped the CCSS spread.
Under the spell of authoritarianism, Americans have willingly
surrendered their beloved local governments to state and federal
control. Locally elected school boards have turned into
bureaucratic branches of state and federal government, for in effect,
they only collect local taxes. They then use that tax money to implement
the wishes of the state and federal governments in curriculum,
pedagogy, and assessment.
Authoritarianism has driven America to admire, glorify, and
emulate other authoritarian education systems because they seem to
produce “results”—defined as test scores. Instead of valuing what their
own educational methods can produce, American leaders envy countries
with top test scores in a narrow set of subjects—which is simply a sign
of how successfully those countries have homogenized their students.
Mistaking China’s miseries as secrets to success, for example, American
education pundits and political leaders have been eager to learn from
the quintessential authoritarian education system. Ironically, they’ve
condemned China’s authoritarian political system in the same breath.
A survival strategy the Chinese people developed to cope with
thousands of years of authoritarian rule has been glorified as China’s
secret to educational success. The belief that the Chinese attach high
values to education is widespread in the United States[1, 2]. That
belief has been used to explain the educational success of Chinese
students; it has also been used to condemn Americans in general, and
some racial and cultural groups in particular, for their poor test
scores.
The belief is, however, an illusion at best; a cruel glorification of
authoritarianism at worst. The Chinese people were deprived of any
other means to succeed in life, both spiritually and materially. Their
only option was to pass the exams dictated by the absolute
authority—emperors in the past, and the government today. When people
are convinced that there are no worthy options to pursue in life except
the narrow path prescribed by an authoritarian government, they are
forced to comply, accept indoctrination, and be homogenized. For this
reason, Chinese parents have to invest generously in their children’s
education and test preparation; their efforts mitigate the lack of
sufficient investment from the government. When onlookers praise the
efficiency of the Chinese educational system—in which minimal government
investment begets huge gains in test scores—they ignore the resources
Chinese parents throw into the pot.
The Chinese have also been praised for emphasizing effort and
diligence instead of inherent intelligence or social conditions. Again,
this is no more than a mistaken romanticization of an authoritarian ploy
to deny the existence of individual differences and unequal social
conditions. Emphasizing effort is a convenient way for the authority to
evade responsibility for leveling the playing field for those with
diverse abilities and talents. It is an excuse for not providing
programs for children with disabilities or those born into extremely
unfavorable social circumstances. It also serves as a seductive
marketing slogan, persuading individuals to welcome homogenization.
Admirers also glorify Chinese students’ inability to question and
challenge authority. For instance, Andreas Schleicher, in defending
China’s top PISA ranking, noted how much more likely the Chinese
students are to blame themselves, instead of their teachers, for their
failure in math, compared to their counterparts in France
[10].
While the finding is correct, Schleicher fails to notice its cause: an
authoritarian culture that tends to shift the blame from the authority,
which no one dares question, to the students. This is true in other
authoritarian education systems as well; just look at Russia, Indonesia,
and Singapore.
The Chinese national educational system has won high praise as an
efficient system with national standards, a national curriculum, a high
states test (the college entrance exam), and a clearly defined set of
gateways to mark students’ transitions from one stage to another[3].
Admirers note that every Chinese student has a clear and focused goal to
pursue; Chinese teachers and parents know exactly what to do to help
their students; and the government knows exactly which schools are doing
well.
What those admirers ignore is the fact that such an education
system, while being an effective machine to instill what the government
wants students to learn, is incapable of supporting individual
strengths, cultivating a diversity of talents, and fostering the
capacity and confidence to create.
I wrote this book to show how
China, a perfect incarnation of
authoritarian education, has produced the world’s best test scores at
the cost of diverse, creative, and innovative talents. I also
tried to illustrate how difficult it is to move away from authoritarian
thinking, by showing how China has struggled to reform its education for
over a century. The book is intended to warn the United States and
other Western countries about the dangerous consequences of educational
authoritarianism.
Education in the West must go through transformative changes. A
paradigm shift will be necessary, if we are to prepare children to live
successfully in the new world. (I wrote about this shift in my previous
book,
World Class Learners: Educating Creative and Entrepreneurial Students [4]). As traditional routine jobs are offshored and automated, we need
more and more globally competent, creative, innovative, entrepreneurial
citizens—job creators instead of employment-minded job seekers. To
cultivate new talents, we need an education that enhances individual
strengths, follows children’s passions, and fosters their
social-emotional development. We do
not need an authoritarian education that aims to fix children’s deficits according to externally prescribed standards.
If the U.S. and the West are concerned about being overtaken by China, the best solution is to avoid becoming China.
The empire that led the world for over two millennia was shattered by
Western technological and scientific innovations in the 1800s. Its
education represents the best of the past. It worked extremely well for
China’s imperial rulers for over 1,000 years, but it stopped working
when the modern world emerged. The Chinese system continued to produce
students who excel in a narrow range of subjects. Only 10% of its
college graduates are deemed employable by multinational businesses[5],
because these students lack the very qualities our new society needs.
China’s achievements over the past thirty years should be no reason
for America and other Western nations to panic, as forewarned by French
historian Nicolas Boulanger more than 250 years ago:
All the remains of her ancient institutions, which China
now possesses, will necessarily be lost; they will disappear in the
future revolutions; as what she hath already lost of them vanished in
former ones; and finally, as she acquires nothing new, she will always
be on the losing side. [8, p. 134].
References
1. Tucker, M.,
Chinese Lessons: Shanghai’s Rise to the Top of the PISA League Tables. 2014, National Center on Education and the Economy: Washington DC.
2. Cheng, K.-m.,
Shanghai: How a Big City in a Developing Country Leaped to the Head of the Class, in
Surpassing Shanghai: An Agenda for American Education Built on the World’s Leading Systems, M.S. Tucker, Editor. 2011, Harvard Education Press: Cambridge, MA. p. 21-50.
3. Tucker, M., ed.
Surpassing Shanghai: An Agenda for American Education Built on the World’s Leading Systems. 2011, Harvard Education Press: Boston.
4. Zhao, Y.,
World Class Learners: Educating Creative and Entrepreneurial Students. 2012, Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.
5. Farrell, D. and A.J. Grant,
China’s looming talent shortage. 2005, McKinsey and Company: New York.
[1] Press release of American Association of School Administrators on February 29, 2009 at
http://www.aasa.org/content.aspx?id=1592
[2] http://www.aera.net/Portals/38/docs/News_Media/News%20Releases%202010/Annual%20Meeting%20Awards.pdf
[3] http://www.11alive.com/assetpool/documents/130329074503_APS-Indictment-Announcement.pdf
[4] A
USA Today investigative
report in 2011 revealed over 1,600 cases of cheating in six states and
Washington DC
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/education/2011-03-06-school-testing_N.htm
[5]
http://www.11alive.com/news/article/196896/40/Secretary-of-Education-stunned-by-scandal?__hstc=215845384.d6c6693f407f802334dab4314f40436c.1365186589630.1365186589630.1365186589630.1
[6] Press release of American Association of School Administrators on February 29, 2009 at
http://www.aasa.org/content.aspx?id=1592
[7] http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/20/education/scarred-by-cheating-scandal-atlanta-schools-are-on-the-mend.html?pagewanted=all
[8] http://www.npr.org/2013/04/10/176784631/el-paso-schools-cheating-scandal-probes-officials-accountability
[9] http://www.texasobserver.org/faking-the-grade-the-nasty-truth-behind-lorenzo-garcias-miracle-school-turnaround-in-el-paso/
[10] http://oecdeducationtoday.blogspot.com/2013/12/are-chinese-cheating-in-pisa-or-are-we.html
