If you were educated in Florida prior to your college career, you likely endured several years of FCAT testing. I didn’t mind FCAT days, mostly because I had the fortune of being good test-taker. For me, test days were a nice break in the monotony of classes—a day where snack breaks occurred more often and a signal of the upcoming summer break.
But for a good portion of students, FCAT days are dreaded and exhausting. Some of my friends described emotions ranging from overwhelmed to those of paralyzing anxiety. The day when your scores came in the mail could be equally as bad.
There’s a tendency in some to dismiss underperformance on these standardized tests by deeming the student “dumb” or “incapable of learning,” but I’m willing to bet that this is hardly the case. Some people just don’t test well. Some people have a bad testing environment. Some people just have a bad test day.
Test results in these cases are not always indicative of the student’s intellect or learning improvement. Nor are they all the time indicative of the teacher’s skill set, or school’s capacity to provide a well-rounded education to all students. But these minor details have not seemed to enjoy much consideration in our federal government’s approach to education (as evidenced by the No Child Left Behind Act.)
And now, our state government is taking a stab at a standards-based approach on a different level: merit-based pay for teachers.
The bill currently moving through the Florida legislature makes student performance the heaviest factor in deciding teachers’ salaries. If signed by Governor Crist, SB 6 will link salary increases and certification to student performance on such standardized tests. If this sounds like a good idea to you in theory, take a moment to think about the following:
Remember how boring it was to take FCAT practice tests? Remember entire class periods spent practicing the proper way to bubble your scantron and open your FCAT question booklet? Remember being taught about specific types of questions? Remember learning the correct way to write an FCAT essay?
I do. And I recall thinking that this wasn’t the type of learning I wanted. It was teaching to the test. Looking back now, it was exactly like an LSAT prep course, minus the entire class being on Adderall.
(And that was before merit-based pay.)
Or consider a situation in which a teacher, fresh out of graduate school, is deciding where he/she wants a job. If his/her salary is based on student performance, he/she seems more likely apply for a position at Satellite High School in Brevard County (ranked number 18 in 2002 for Florida high schools) as opposed to one at West Street High School in Sumter County (ranked dead last.)
Or maybe he/she will just decide the risk of teaching in Florida isn’t worth the stress and head to another state that treats educators in a different fashion.
As if that possibility wasn’t bad enough, there’s more. SB 6 also eliminates tenure for new teachers, forcing them into single-year contracts with little job security. A single year contract and absolutely no tenure? You’d have to be slightly crazy to sign up for a career in that environment.
Look, given the current economic climate, it’s completely understandable to want to cut the state budget by considerable means. But education shouldn’t be treated as if it is fat in-need of trimming. Cut the budget somewhere else. Or here’s an idea for the Florida legislators supporting the bill: How about merit-based income for yourselves?
In an increasingly global economy, our nation’s education system is arguably in the best position to ensure America’s competitiveness in rapidly changing industries and a new world market. Standardized tests do not necessarily measure quality as much as they measure quantity. These tests reflect the amount of students who pass their FCAT per classroom, per school, per year. Nothing more.
Linking teacher’s salaries to the quantity of passing and improved test scores arguably devalues the quality of the educational experience for both teacher and student.
Is the quality of your child’s education, your little brother’s education, your niece’s education, or even the quality of your future—something that you’d like your state legislature to take a gamble on?
