Oh, the of End of Grade frenzy! CMS battling to get those test scores up! How will it end?
Not too well, no matter the scores on North Carolina’s test. Once again the NC test has received low marks — a D minus — from researchers looking at state-wide tests. The NC test is simply too easy when compared to the National Assessment of Educational Progress, the only true nation-wide measure of student performance. In contrast, Paul E. Peterson and Frederick M. Hess of the Hoover Instituion give South Carolina’s test regime an A. The difference? The SC test scores actually closely match the state’s NAEP scores, an indication that SC is holding its students to some sort of national performance standard.
North Carolina, and CMS by extension, is engaged in a sort of massive propaganda campaign to convince parents and taxpayers that the schools are doing fine and getting better.
