Measuring Education by Test Scores

Your article on the California Assessment Program (“Test Goals Unmet at Many Schools,” June 20 by Pam Moreland) cited one major deficiency in using CAP scores to judge the quality of schools. State Supt. Bill Honig feels that year-to-year improvement in these scores is a very important indicator of educational quality, and state law provides a special grant to schools that show such improvement. However, when the CAP scores at a school are already quite high, it is very hard to show further improvement each year.

There are other deficiencies in Honig’s emphasis on CAP scores for measuring educational quality. Honig expects schools to strive to raise their scores enough to reach the top quartile of schools. By definition, exactly 25% of all schools will always be in the top quartile, never any more or any less. To enter the top quartile, a school must displace a school already there. For each school entering the top quartile, another school must fall into a lower quartile. Honig should be more concerned about the overall, statewide quality of public education and less concerned about the relative standings of individual schools.

Another deficient emphasis is Honig’s desire to evaluate the CAP scores at individual schools for students grouped by ethnic and socioeconomic characteristics. There is serious question whether any valid results could be obtained from such categorization. Past attempts to categorize students according to such characteristics have been so full of errors as to be worthless.

The worst deficiency in this emphasis on judging the quality of schools according to CAP scores is that it creates strong pressure to “teach to the tests” rather than teaching critical thinking and an appreciation of learning. This pressure results in a loss of emphasis on those subjects that are not tested, such as art, vocational skills and foreign languages.

Too often, politicians want a number for measuring the quality of education. Usually, they are merely responding to the wishes of their voters. To paraphrase Oscar Wilde, we are cynically measuring education without any interest in knowing its value.

DAVID E. ROSS

Agoura