High Stakes
Assessments
M6 U1 A3/Ximena
Rojas Armstrong
It is important to
reflect on the complex issue of standardized educational evaluation applied in
most of countries. A high-stakes test or a standard educational evaluation
is any test used to make important decisions about students, educators,
schools, or districts, most commonly for the purpose of accountability, on the
attempt by federal, state, or local government agencies and school
administrators to ensure that students are enrolled in effective schools and
being taught by effective teachers.
At ACS, here in
Bolivia, since it an American school, children in elementary grade 3-5 are
tested once a year with the MAP, which is an acronym for Measures of Academic
Progress. I am not part of the test because I teach Spanish K-5.
Grade 5 students take
tests in Reading, Language Use, Math, and Science. Grades 3 and 4 students take
Reading, Language Use, and Math. The tests are administered in three or four
separate sessions on three or four different days. Technically, there is no
time limit, but most students complete the test in about 40 minutes. Students
are allowed an hour for each testing session, but are also provided for Extra
Time sessions. Students are permitted to stop their test and continue it at a
later time or on a different day. Anyone who misses a testing session will be
asked to complete the test at another time. We have several Extra Time sessions
built into the schedule. The scores on the MAP are only part of the information
that ACS gathers about students. When a student is struggling, classroom
performance, teacher comments and observations are all used together to make
decisions about students.
On the other the
education system don’t use standardized testing because the Bolivian
government, does not dedicate sufficient funds to pay highly qualified teachers,
funds to maintain decent schools, classrooms, decent meals, or buses for student’s
transportation. On the average a Bolivian teacher working for public schools
makes between 200-400 US $., therefore not motivated teachers make the quality
of education at public schools and universities in general, lower than at
private options. Standarized testing would be a difficult task for the
government, specially in rural areas due to the lack of technology in schools.
Bolivian students live
in high poverty, very poor scientific and technological development, and high
levels of violence. It is documented that the problem is generated from the
education system where children and young people drop out or end up with low
educational level, which does not allow them to make plans for a dignified
life. It is therefore urgent to obtain truthful information, do the relevant
analysis, develop more coherent interpretation, encourage reflection and build
the most objective solutions for the reorganization of the education system, so
we can transform the reality of the region.
There is no
standardized testing in Bolivian public schools. There is an urgent need of a
culture of evaluation, rated as important by all participants in the
educational system actors. As a matter of fact a culture of educational
evaluation would involve as a first step, self-assessment (teacher, school,
country) to realize themselves of how their work is done. This reflection would
show from within whether or not the teacher meets the standards performance.
But, in the absence of this evaluative culture and especially of the self-evaluation
that leads to self-criticism make essential and standardized assessments of
national and international Latin-American school.
A comprehensive,
education reform has made some significant changes here in Bolivia. The educational
reform proposes profound changes in all areas of primary education: reorganizes
the education system poses an intercultural and bilingual education puts the emphasis
on the / the student and learning, and seeks to reform teacher training. The transformation
also includes, among others, development, production and distribution of
educational materials; training teachers and principals and core educational
unit; the transformation of school supervision subsystem; the transformation of
teacher training subsystem; implementing a measurement subsystem the quality of
education.
It would be very hard
for me to compare these two educational systems. But from what I see at the
American School where I work high skate testing has many disadvantages, among them:
- Narrowing curriculum to the subjects being tested
- Excluding topics that are not being directly tested
- Diluting learning down to rote memorization and a "beat the
test" mentality
- Devoting too much classroom time to test preparation rather than learning
I am hopeful that I can help my students cope with
the pressure and stress of these tests even though I am not involved in the
testing process. Testing at its core is an experience of stress and pressure
whether students like it or not, stress and pressure are part of the real
world. I think of high-stakes testing as a method to help teachers self-reflect
their teaching to be able to improve and look for more professional
development. Most of the students I teach will go to US universities therefore they
need to learn to cope with standardized testing. Parents approve the use
of these tests because they are focused in the future of their children.
Talavera, M. (2014) Magisterio boliviano y Reformas Educativas en
el siglo XX. http://www.revistasbolivianas.org.bo/scielo.php?pid=S2078-03622014000100004&script=sci_arttext
Froemel, J. (2009). La efectividad y la
eficacia de las mediciones estandarizadas y de las evaluaciones en educación.
Revista Iberoamericana de Evaluación Educativa, 2(1).Letelier, M. (2009).
http://inesad.edu.bo/developmentroast/2006/10/what-do-we-really-know-about-education-quality-in-bolivia/
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