Palm Beach Post, The (Florida)
April 22, 2011
HEADLINE: U.S. education official gets earful

By Jason Schultz

Hundreds of angry parents and teachers packed a middle school auditorium Thursday to tell a top U.S. education official that the state and federal governments need to stop evaluating teachers and students based on test results.

"If you teach by rote, you are going to educate students that become sheep," Boynton Beach resident Vivian D'Angio said at a public meeting hosted by U.S. Rep. Ted Deutch, D-Boca Raton, at Don Estridge High Tech Middle School.

The meeting let residents voice concerns over the No Child Left Behind Act, a federal law President George W. Bush signed in 2002.

It requires 100 percent of students to be deemed proficient as measured by their performance on standardized tests, such as the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test, by 2014.

Michael Yudin, deputy secretary of policy and strategic initiatives for the U.S. Department of Education, came to listen. Deutch said the federal government is working on reforming and reauthorizing the law in the next few months.

Most of the comments blasted the law's emphasis on standardized test results to measure student and teacher success. They also faulted programs such as the merit pay bill passed by the state legislature.

"If you do all this testing and it's all just 'teach to the test,' what about 'teaching to know'?" Lynn University education major Rebecca Smith asked.

The crowd started to grumble when Yudin mentioned testing. He said the Obama administration wants to base teacher pay on several factors, including test results. But he said some form of testing is needed.

Former U.S. Department of Education official and author Diane Ravitch spoke via satellite to point out what she called the failures of No Child Left Behind, merit pay, vouchers and other ideas she said are coming from a "corporate reform" movement that is pushing privatization in schools and stressing test results.

Ravitch said teachers are being blamed for results on tests when society and poverty are much bigger factors in a student's scores. She said society has become obsessed with celebrity and money and has devalued education.

"Our public schools are not failing," Ravitch said. "Our public schools reflect our society."