The American Federation of Teachers (AFT) union has put together a short cartoon about the No Child Left Behind law. It is catchy in a “I know nothing about the performing arts” sort of way.
STOP HERE if you are only interested in the cartoon.
The key line in the cartoon is that the law “should measure progress.” Officials at the U.S. Department of Education are looking at growth formulas (state-established expectations of the educational growth of the same groups of students from one year to the next) similar to what we have in North Carolina. Of course, these formulas were so reliable that they “forced” the NC Department of Public Instruction to throw out last year’s 6th grade reading scores. So, this year we have the promise of new formulas, namely a change scale that is a simplified, standardized scale (similar to t scores). From what I understand, the change scale requires two years of pretests under the new formula, so if things do not work out this year, listen for the pretest cop-out. And if the U.S. DOE decides to use a growth formula of any kind, then expect Armageddon.
