IMPACT OF HIGH SCHOOL PREPARATION
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using calculators to solve abstract problems. Nor should he be burdened
with remembering such details as the names and geographical locations of
the fifty states. The important thing is that he know where to look up such
information. Nor should the granting of a diploma be contingent on the
mastery of any skills demonstrated by an objective test of the discredited
multiple-choice variety, dependent as it is on reading comprehension, a
skill most of the members of the current teaching pool themselves are
unable to demonstrate having mastered.
The Praxis I exam, the teacher competency test devised by the
Educational Testing Service and used by some twenty states, assesses only
the most basic reading, writing, and math skills. The test sets such prob–
lems as to arrange World War I, the Great Depression, the New Deal, and
the Korean War in correct chronological order, a task that eludes many
would-be teachers. On a scale running from 600 to 695, the national aver–
age for test-takers is 657. The questions on California's Basic Educational
Skills Test are no more difficult than the state's proposed math standards
for fifth-graders- and only two-thirds of would-be teachers pass the first
time around. In my home state, New York, the Teacher Certification
Exam tests reading skills that should be the province of any normal sixth–
grader and no substantive knowledge of any kind. But where there is no
fixed body of knowledge, only "multiple perspectives," what can be test–
ed beyond what are considered good intentions?
The portfolio assessment is the favored mode of-what shall one say? Not
judgment, or grading, both ofwhich are frowned upon-perhaps appraisal
will
do. And this appraisal is only to serve the purpose of acquainting the teacher
with the student's individual approach to problem solving, whatever it may be.
There is to be no competition for academic placement such as grades, no
honor roll, no rewards for achievement, and no risks of failure. It's a no-fault
system in which the team approach results in group grades. Group learning is
considered more democratic, presumably because the essence of democracy is
taken to be that everyone should be indistinguishable, rather than that every–
one should have the opportunity to distinguish himself.
And everything in ed school reinforces these values and these attitudes,
honed by the followers of John Dewey and promulgated by such founts of
progressive education philosophy as Columbia University's Teachers College.
These entrenched educrats, the professors of education, the adminis–
trators of left-liberal foundations, the union officials and the legislators
who owe much to their financial support and their lobbying efforts, and
above all the dedicated members of the United States Department of
Education,
claim
that there is a crisis in our schools.
There is always a crisis in our schools, and a concomitant crying need
for reform. But there is reason to question the nature of the crisis at hand.
