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What
is clearly lacking is a nationwide system for comparative performance
purposes, using standard formats.”
Thus spoke Mr. Charles Miller, chairman of The Commission on the
Future of Higher Education, established by U.S. Secretary of Education
Margaret Spellings. To the finely tuned nervous system of higher
education, standardized testing has a ripple effect, implying uniform
national standards and a national curriculum. You might as well
lob a bomb through the ivy-framed window of academia.
Government has danced awkwardly with higher education for decades.
Both insist on taking the lead and both need a ready partner more
than either is willing to admit. Critics ask if higher education
is delivering a viable product for the money invested. For its $80
billion annual expenditure, the government is asking basic questions:
What are students learning? Are they prepared for the challenges
and complexities of the world of work?
To those in higher education, however, national standardized assessment
is a fool’s errand, like finding the right color in the rainbow.
The greatest strengths of American higher education are its
independence and diversity. Is it possible to set common measures
of learning across the entire landscape, from Cal Tech to Juilliard,
from small private colleges to the sprawling state systems?
Eighty billion dollars of government passion versus the stubborn
zeal of lifelong educators makes for a spirited and meaningful debate.
As is often the case, however, the two viewpoints share more in
common than meets the eye. To begin, there is widespread acknowledgement
throughout higher education that too many graduates lack proficiency
in core skills. In a volatile workforce, written and oral communication,
technological acumen and higher order thinking are priorities, crucial
beyond even job-specific expertise. Entire industries, let alone
particular jobs, are born and retired in a day’s work.
Higher education is hardly resistant to the need for measuring student
learning. College faculties are eager to know if genuine understanding
has been the result of their labor. Well beyond
midterms, finals and letter grades,
specific learning outcomes in each
subject and discipline now shape the assessment criteria. New research
is also identifying stumbling blocks and critical transition points
in the learning process. Contrary to the beleaguered notions of
assessment, this is a rich, demographic-specific approach to learning
and assessment.
National standardized testing will likely provide the comparative
performance measure urged by Mr. Miller. The value that offers to
individual students and institutions is questionable. What is clear
is that genuine assessment should be ongoing and embedded in the
curriculum, a continuing dialogue between student and teacher that
is integral to the learning process. Not only a measure of competency
and understanding, good assessment teaches accountability and maturity.
Its ultimate aim is self-
assessment, the willingness to look in the mirror honestly long
after one leaves the campus environment.
An honest self-assessment points to a deepening crisis in American
education and American society. More than half of all college students
arrive with deficiencies in basic skills of writing, reading or
math. In many urban institutions that number reaches as high as
80 percent of freshman enrollment. Still more students, many thoroughly
qualified for college, fade into subsistence jobs for lack of adequate
financial support. Poverty and the rising cost of living impact
the nation’s workforce on a daily basis.
But solutions exist if we are willing to reassess our efforts. Effective
collaboration between colleges and high schools is long overdue.
Valuing teachers and paying them for the most important job in society
is beyond overdue. A great teacher set free in a classroom is an
astonishing resource. And while we’re advancing the number
of students ready for college, let’s reverse the slide of
need-based financial aid that has closed the door to college for
millions of eager students.
That’s a beginning. The standardized testing debate is a valuable
inquiry, but only if it alerts us to the larger challenges before
us, challenges that confront our entire social order. That’s
an essential self-assessment. |
