How Curriculum Quality and Standardized Tests Affect Achievement Gaps

How Curriculum Quality and Standardized Tests Affect Achievement Gaps

Curriculum Quality

Singham (2003) stated that academic resources have much greater power than SES in predicting college degree completion.  School administrators need to use the best research available about what makes students want to learn, and then provide teachers with the kinds of mentoring, training, and feedback that can take them from average teachers to highly skilled professional teachers who have a transforming effect on students.
Singham observed that such curricula would narrow the learning gap between Caucasians and minorities, at the same time increasing the performance on tests of both groups in every category.  The quality of tests has a direct impact on how well different segments of U.S. society are represented in the statistics, as discussed in the following section.

 Standardized Tests

In the 1800s, Horace Mann introduced the concept of using examinations in Boston schools to gain “objective information about the quality of teaching and learning in urban schools, monitor the quality of instruction, and compare schools and teachers within each school” (Gallagher, p. 85).  The tests revealed differences in student knowledge, and subsequently additional testing was implemented to facilitate judgments about student advancement (Scott, 2004).

Mann’s exams were so successful they were adopted by school systems across the country.  Achievement tests, considered objective and comprehensive, became a popular method for assessing learning.
World War I also had a significant impact on testing strategies in the early 20th century.  The U.S. Army required a method for quickly identifying potential officers among large numbers of recruits.  To do so, Arthur Otis and Robert Yerkes developed the Alpha Army Test, which gauged a soldier’s mental capabilities.  The Alpha Army Test, which had an efficient and effective scoring method, became a model for many future standardized tests.  The test changed the image of standardized testing, and as a result, patent and copyright requests for tests soared.  Student tracking became widely used in schools as standardized tests were used to sort students into different curricula based on abilities.

Nothing is simple about educational testing, though popular belief holds otherwise (Ickes-Dunbar, 2005).  Ickes-Dunbar found that the illusion of objectivity is extremely appealing to everyone’s deep wish for fair and precise tools to assess learning and to predict the future success for students.  Tests, in various forms, hold high credibility in U.S. society as valid and reliable indicators of achievement and aptitude.  The intuitive trust that the public places on standardized testing reflects a widespread naiveté, which discourages questioning test validity.  Current public demand for test results is apparently motivated by a reasonable need to measure whether students are acquiring knowledge, and a perceived need to hold teachers and programs accountable for competency and efficacy (Ickes-Dunbar).

The complexities of test reliability and validity are poorly understood, even by those who are directly impacted by standardized tests, including teachers, who generally lack the expertise to evaluate assessment tools, students, who accept their role as passive consumers of tests, and parents, who want children to do well on any and every test (Ickes-Dunbar).  Despite the appealing cachet of the NCLB, standardized tests are high-stakes and have the effect of sorting students along SES and linguistic divides.  Standardized tests that are a result of the NCLB also have the deleterious backwash effect of blaming teachers and students themselves for substandard performance (Ickes-Dunbar).

Waters and Boyes-Watson (2005) found that, as prediction mechanisms, standardized tests are somewhat ineffective in predicting the future performance of prospective students or employees.  Such tests cannot predict or assess drive, motivation, or the values an individual brings to career or future contributions to society.  As methods for ensuring fairness, standardized test scores are highly correlated with SES and reflect the cumulative advantages of class, rather than the inherent abilities of the candidate (Waters & Boyes-Watson). Sturm and Guinier (2005) reported that tests are fundamentally unfair in some respects.

In addition to standardized tests, youth culture, as opposed to societal culture, as it impacts student achievement, has been studied by researchers, as summarized in the following section.
Research done by Quintero and Cooks (2002) showed that, to measure the achievement fairly, standardized tests must continue to be closely examined and changed to include more relevant content for all cultures, especially for students of color.   All students would benefit from some type of authentic assessment.  Authentic assessment allows students to illustrate important information in more informal ways.  Quintero and Cooks presented some points about the quality of current standardized tests, positing that the scope of skills and concepts assessed on a standardized test are greater than necessary.

The purpose of the test, which is to assess a student performance on the curriculum, is largely forgotten.  Sometimes the context used for testing prompts on standardized writing tests is too narrow and exclusive.  “For students, whose cultural backgrounds are rich and varied, cultural bias poses an equally strong potential barrier to exam success in the current standardized test form” (p. 63).