Rhee's testing legacy: An open question

11-03-2010

Guest blog by Matthew Di Carlo/Washington Post

Hardly anybody, regardless of their opinion about the newly departed D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee thinks that test scores alone are an adequate indicator of student success. But this is how the debate has unfolded, in no small part because of her own emphasis on them. Her aim was to raise scores and, with few exceptions (also here and here), even those who objected to her “abrasive” style and controversial policies seem to believe that she succeeded wildly in the testing area. This conclusion is premature. A review of the record shows that Rhee’s test score “legacy” is an open question. There are three main points to consider: First, (by Rhee’s own admission) two simple policy changes enacted in 2007 were made, in part, to generate artificial test score gains during her first year (when roughly 75 percent of the DC-CAS increases occurred). Second, the district’s DC-CAS test was introduced in 2006, and a year or two after any new test is introduced – as students, teachers, and administrators become more familiar with it – it’s common to see an artificial inflation in scores. The beginning of Rhee’s tenure coincided with this period. Third, the students enrolled in D.C. public schools in 2010 were a significantly different group compared with the students of 2007, and this demographic shift may have driven some of the improvement in DC-CAS performance. (more…)

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