What I found in researching this project reaffirmed a belief I've learned through working at Tarrant City Schools. If we teach to a level that is higher than what is expected, the students will perform at that level and beyond. We must expect more in order to get more.
There are days that are tough and there are days that reaffirm all the possibility that lies in the youth. You may have a fight in your class that is so brutal, one might give up on the humanity of man; however, you also may discuss the American Dream in the next class. You see the American Dream in the face of students learning and in the face of students crying and yelling about making their family proud. It's terrifying, rigorous, but absolutely the most pressing issue of Modern America. You see the failures and the possibilities in your face and a teacher is met with the challenge of making those faces believe that their dreams are possible while Time Magazine's cover, "Restoring the American Dream," describes most Americans as "glum, dispirited and angry." You see the American Dream in its rawest form: imperfect, stubborn, failing, and disappointing.
High-stakes assessments effect us all. It causes stress, and it causes more work which at times seems unnecessary. However, assessment gives us a benchmark for how our schools are doing. With the criticism of Bush's No Child Left Behind, the effects are evident, but it seems also a de jeure remedy to a much deeper problem with the American system. As Mayor Cory Booker observed of the New York Public School systems, "The struggles I see they shouldn’t be the struggles we see in modern America…We should not live in a country where your destiny is determined by how much money you have in your pocket, by what zip code you live in, or by the pick of a ball." Our lives have become about test scores but with all the stress, I think we as educators must take a moment to realize the infinite magnitude which lies in what we do as part of the educational field. While a politician's quick fix will always be with us, we must strive for more and expect this from our students. We are in the business of the American Dream which has never been easy.
By focusing on what’s possible, the end result being the dream, that was all the effect on testing I needed. If we as teachers constantly choose innovative teaching methods, the students will rise to the occasion. Teaching students to ask questions and work through problems are clear life skills which make sense. The question became the difference in scores and dreams. We must understand why students are where they are, meet them there, and move them forward. For too long, many students have believed that average is acceptable, that just passing is ok, and that they aren't going anywhere. However, I believe it's because they see their dreams so far out of their reach, they simply resign. As one of my students responded to my inquiry in defining the American Dream, "People lower their standards on what life they want to have for themselves and it is saddening. People have reduced it to nothing.”
Below are some relevant articles on the controversy of high stakes testing:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2007-01-07-no-child_x.htm
http://www.fairtest.org/arn/caseagainst.html
"The hunger and thirst for knowledge, the keen delight in the chase, the good humored willingness to admit that the scent was false, the eager desire to get on with the work, the cheerful resolution to go back and begin again, the broad good sense, the unaffected modesty, the imperturbable temper, the gratitude for any little help that was given - all these will remain in my memory though I cannot paint them for others." Frederic William Maitland
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