Test Prep as a High School course?

February 07, 2004

An article by Susan Snyder in today's Philadelphia Inquirer reminds us of a number of problems with our current state of education and testing.

There's a new curriculum requirement in Philadelphia's public high schools this winter. Call it Test Prep 101, à la Kaplan Inc.

The school district told its 11th-grade English and math teachers that they must spend 20 minutes a day for the next 10 weeks using a test-preparation program developed by the New York City-based Kaplan - an educational-services company perhaps best known for its test-preparation programs.

One of the direct side-effects of high stakes testing is that the act of testing is becoming so important, it's starting to cause folks to forget that that teaching and learning are what schools are for, not test-prepping.

But schools are just taking natural steps to defend themselves. Inflict them with high-stakes testing, and they will react in ways which may not always be seen as best for kids. Thus in Philly we have the new "test-prep" curriculum.

This is not a simple issue. On the one hand we have a big-city school district which knows that one way to do better on standardized tests is to have students go though test-prep programs such as those by Kaplan. So is it wrong for them to do just that?

But dig beneath the surface and the issue is much more serious.

One needs to ask what has happened in the previous 10 or 11 years of schooling that these students would go through the system and emerge as high school juniors, only to need test prep courses to do better on a standardized test? Isn't it just possible that if the school district did its job properly, there would be no such need for test prepping?

In our view, standardized tests are intended to measure learning, not test-prepping. Thus the Philly program, while it may well boost scores, will simply serve to mask the real problem.

It's possible that schools could take a page from Kaplan's book:

Ed Chango, assistant principal at Frankford High School, praised the program: "I like that it's prescriptive. Students can take a pre-test, and teachers can find out where they are and can hammer away at their area of weakness."

Hello? The best schools know this is what you're supposed to do in the first place!

A school can never make an assumption that students are on-level with all skills and all subjects, and informal, school-based diagnostic testing can work wonders. The purpose of such testing is to diagnose a student's problem, such that the teacher can respond, and boost the kid up to where he should be.

What's a school to do when it receives under-prepared students? (This can be at any level from K-12, although is inexcusable at the college level, for they should not admit unprepared students in the first place).

There are two responses. One is to roll up one's sleeves and redouble one's efforts to getting the students on track (the most successful open-enrollment schools have known this--and done this--for years). This is where diagnostic testing and remediation come in.

The second possible response is to simply bemoan student's lack of preparation.

It's been our experience that many mediocre schools, especially in our cities, fall for the second response. Thus when these schools--full of unprepared students (always the fault of their former teachers)--are faced with high-stakes testing, the easiest response is to teach to the test with a test-prep curriculum:

"The old adage of not teaching to the test is no longer valid," said Chango, a former math department head. "It's a high-stakes test. The federal government has accountability. The state has accountability, and we have to respond."

While we're all for accountability, we're not enamored with the Frankenstein's-monster-response to forced accountability to federal and state authorities with their high-stakes testing.

We much prefer accountability to parents. (Vouchers, anyone?)