Document Type
Article
Publication Date
3-19-2018
Keywords
test scores, evaluation, No Child Left Behind Act, education reform, STEM schools
Abstract
Almost every major education reform of the past 20 years at both the state and national level has rested on a common assumption: Standardized test scores are an accurate and appropriate measure of success and failure. It has followed that programs or policies that increase student scores on standardized tests are “good” and programs that fail to do so are “bad.”
This way of thinking was central to the No Child Left Behind Act. But the same logic was applied elsewhere. The past 20 years has seen explosive growth in school choice programs, and these programs have largely been evaluated based on their impacts on student test scores.
Reading and math tests measure basic skills that almost everyone believes are important. Test scores are convenient to collect. Yet even the most fervent believer in the power of standardized tests agrees that test scores are merely an interim measure. There is no point in increasing test scores for test scores’ sake. Increased test scores are supposed to indicate progress toward more important long-term results.
Citation
McShane, M. Q., & Wolf, P. (2018). Do Impacts on Test Scores Even Matter? Lessons from Long-run Outcomes in School Choice Research. American Enterprise Institute Retrieved from https://scholarworks.uark.edu/ciedpub/26
