Making the Grades

264 pages. Temps de lecture estimé 3h18min.
Just as American educators, parents, and policymakers reconsider the No Child Left Behind Act and its heavy emphasis on standardized testing, Todd Farley’s Making the Grades raises questions about the validity of large-scale educational assessments. His behind-the-scenes account of the for-profit testing industry is provocative, hilarious, and instructive.In this alternately amusing and appalling exposé of the standardized test industry, fifteen-year veteran Todd Farley describes statisticians who make decisions about students without even looking at their test answers; state education officials willing to change the way tests are scored whenever they don't like the results; and massive, multi-national, for-profit testing companies who regularly opt for expediency and profit over the altruistic educational goals of teaching and learning. Although there are absurd moments--as when Farley and coworkers had to grade students based on how they described the taste of their favorite food-- the enormous importance of standardized tests in the post “No Child Left Behind” era make this no laughing matter. “This book is dynamite! The nice personal voice makes it utterly accessible and enticing, wholly apart from the terribly important ammunition it provides to those of us in the `testing wars' at national and local levels.”—Jonathan Kozol, author of Savage Inequities Preface AcknowledgmentsPART 1 WAGE SLAVEChapter 1. SCORING MONKEY Chapter 2. NUMBERS Chapter 3. THE WHEAT FROM THE CHAFF Chapter 4. OFF TASKPART 2 MANAGEMENTChapter 5. TABLE LEADER Chapter 6. THE ORACLE OF PRINCETON Chapter 7. THE KING OF SCORINGChapter 8. A REAL JOBPART 3 RETIREMENTChapter 9. MY OWN PRIVATE HALLIBURTON Chapter 10. WORKING IN THEORY Chapter 11. WARM BODIESEpilogueIndex About the Author