Stay Connected
Subscribe to our Biweekly Digest, event invitations, and more.
Sector Spotlight
Report Release: Reforming Teacher Pensions for a Changing Work Force
New Education Sector report examines teacher pensions and details the problems facing current state pension programs.
Sport or Not? A Question for the Courts
Senior Policy Analyst Elena Silva interviewed by the New York Times on Title IX.
Teachers Unions as Agents of Reform
Brad Jupp, an architect of Denver's landmark performance-based teacher pay system, ProComp, is an outspoken advocate of both labor organizing and quality education for disadvantaged kids. In this interview, Jupp talks about ProComp, his views on teacher unionism, and the future of the teaching profession.
Education Sector Welcomes Three New Board Members
Education Sector's board of directors names three prominent leaders in the fields of education and journalism to the board: David W. Breneman, Richard Lee Colvin, and Peter McWalters.
For-profit colleges: Do they shortchange students?
Policy Director Kevin Carey comments on a recent Senate HELP Committee hearing on for-profit colleges.
Research and Reports
Education Sector Reports
Margins of Error: The Testing Industry in the No Child Left Behind Era
- Author:
- Thomas Toch
- Publication Date:
- January 31, 2006
- Read more about
- K-12 Accountability Systems/NCLB
State standards and standardized tests have become dominant forces in American public schooling. For most of its history, public education in the U.S. was a local matter, with local schools and school systems setting their own educational priorities. But in the wake of mounting evidence that the preparation most students received from public schools wouldn't suffice in a postindustrial economy, and with the conscience of the nation having been transformed by the civil rights movement, policymakers began to pursue a new paradigm, one that sought to establish statewide public school standards and hold local educators accountable if their students fell short of these standards. Standardized tests, used to measure student performance against the new state expectations, are the linchpin of this strategy of standards-based reform.
"Margins of Error" reveals how factors such as the scale of standardized testing required by NCLB, competitive pressures in the testing industry, tight regulatory deadlines, a dearth of testing experts, and lax state oversight are resulting in tests that in many states undermine NCLB's pursuit of higher academic standards. The report provides recommendations for both state and federal policymakers to strengthen the nation's testing infrastructure.
Download
Margins of Error: The Testing Industry in the No Child Left Behind Era (305K)
[description]
[download]
Reader to read PDF files.