After reading Diane Ravitch's blog on her views of testing in today's school system, she brought some very astonishing points to my attention. Early in the article, she discusses the ways the test scores and graduation rates are actually the highest they've ever been in history; dropout rates are lowest we've had in years. However, it's obvious that as a society we aren't focusing on these aspects. We're too busy creating more tests to apparently "challenge" not only our students, but also our teachers. She supports that perhaps some schools are continuing low graduation rates, high dropout rates, and low test scores. But, this is happening in areas of poverty where school systems and students are majorly underfunded. Therefore, all of the so called 'steps' we're taking as an education system aren't focusing enough on the real 'heart/basis' of the problem. If perhaps society would be focusing more on helping these poorer schools excel, while maintaining the way that all the average/higher income schools are doing, then the education system wouldn't be in such chaos and debate like the way it is today. The basis of what I'm trying to get at is that testing is making school a process that no child wants to go through. Going to school is becoming more and more stressful and dreadful in an unhealthy way for the students. We discuss over and over again the way school needs to be a mixture between fun and learning; this is not being accomplished in the school systems today. Below is the link to Diane's posting, the article discusses so many evident questions and topics about the debates with education today. I'm looking forward to further discussing these topics as a group in class on Wednesday.
http://www.salon.com/2013/09/18/diane_ravitch_testing_and_vouchers_hurt_our_schools_heres_what_works/
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