This book represents one of the first extensive investigations
of the effects of statewide testing policies on local school
districts. It focuses on the increasingly popular tool in education
of promoting reform by comparison. There is a prevailing assumption
among policymakers and state education officials that they can
pressure schools into action by comparing schools, school
districts, and states on test performances. However, this pressure
often pushes schools into taking the wrong actions. The authors
have detailed the local responses to statewide, minimum-competency
testing programs in two states and conclude that these responses do
not in any way resemble the kind of serious examination of purpose,
process, and structure involving educators and education
stakeholders that one would associate with the term reform. They
argue that the blame for this lack of progress lies not with
educators' misuse of tests, nor necessarily with the tests
themselves, but with policymaker's misuse of testing as a tool for
reform. The authors' hope is that this volume will contribute to
the demise of a type of educational policy that blocks reform much
more than stimulates it.
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