Five Quick But Interesting Reads Around South Dakota Blogosphere: March 21st Edition

David Montgomery posts some South Dakota politicians March Madness brackets. I really don't care which teams the politicians or South Dakota's first lady picked. I find it interesting, however, that Ben Nesslehuf and Jason Frerichs, who are both under 40, filled out their brackets digitally whereas the older politicians still pulled out a pen or pencil. There seems to be a digital generation gap.

Ken Santema has two good posts about the dangers of CISPA

This P&R Miscellany post points to troublesome efforts to limit speech is provocative.

Finally, I have to admit that I'm ashamed of myself that I missed this one until yesterday, but Cory's report on the South Dakota High School Activities Association State Debate Tournament makes me feel good about coaching debate.

On Pop Culture And Normal

I thought ESPN had ventured into the realm of cult with this advertisement.

This tweet, however, puts things in perspective:

It speaks either brilliantly or terribly of American culture that we have accepted pizza-eating reptiles with swords as totally normal.
— Alyssa Rosenberg (@AlyssaRosenberg) August 3, 2012

It's probably time for someone to write an obituary for the word weird.

What Are Students Being Taught?

A couple of days ago Cooperative Catalyst published a Steve Miranda post that told the story about a student's effort to get into Harvard.

Miranda had informed students "that they should not expect a rubber stamp A on their report card."  That announcement produced the following predictable results.

One student approached me after class and said, “Wait, Miranda, are you saying that there’s a chance I might get a B in this class next semester?”

I replied, “If you do outstanding work like you’re capable of, then I would expect you to earn an A.”

He bolted out of my room and came back about 20 minutes later with a paper for me to sign. “Sorry Miranda, no offense, but I’m dropping the class. I’m trying to get into Harvard and I can’t risk getting a B.”

Miranda then reports that the student got into Harvard but found the result discomforting because once Harvard accepted him, he had no new goal and no way to relax.  Miranda goes on to back up his anecdote by linking to and excerpting this New York Times article about the college application process.  The Times reports,

Students preparing to apply to college are increasingly tailoring their summer plans with the goal of creating a standout personal statement—250 words or more—for the Common Application in which to describe “a significant experience, achievement, risk you have taken or ethical dilemma you have faced and its impact on you.” Specialized, exotic and sometimes costly activities, they hope, will polish a skill, cultivate an interest and put them in the spotlight in a crowded field of straight-A students with strong test scores, community service hours and plenty of extracurricular activities.

Today, the Los Angeles Times publishes a "most athletic" list.  The article reports,

The Times talked to several sports historians and many of them had more difficulty naming contemporary athletic athletes than figures from the past. Because kids today are groomed to be great at a single scholarship-earning sport, historian Richard Crepeau said that questions of athleticism are harder to answer.

"At one time this would have been a fairly simple matter," Crepeau said. "Just go to those who had, or who were capable of playing at the elite level in several sports.

"[But] in modern elite sport across the board there is such attention to training and conditioning that being athletic is nearly a given." [emphasis mine]

Both sports and education seem to have a similar process and send the same message: specialize and look for the glamor.  The kids seem to be mastering the philosophy well.  Perhaps someone is having them recite this mantra as a mnemonic: don't learn or play; just earn and pay.

Tests Test But They Don't Predict

When I read "[a]t my South Bronx elementary school, we had a Teachers College consultant who encouraged us to 'teach tests as a genre of literature,'” I almost lost breakfast and lunch and broke the computer.  After all the Hulk is an acceptable role model.  I'd sooner treat Fox News as real news than entertain the idea that tests can be literature.

Although he doesn't take on NCLB or Race to the Top mandated testing, Jonah Lehrer provides some perspective on testing.  Citing the work of Paul Sackett, psychologist at the University of Minnesota, Lehrer points out that there are two types of performance.  "Maximum" performance occurs when people know they're being tested whereas "typical" performance occurs when people don't know they are being watched.

Lehrer asserts

We live in a society obsessed with maximum performance. Think of exams like the SAT and the GRE. Though these tests take only a few hours, they're supposed to give schools and companies a snapshot of an individual's abiding talents.

Or consider the NFL Scouting Combine, in which players entering the draft perform short physical and mental tasks, such as the 40-yard dash. The Combine is meant to measure physical ability; that's why teams take the results so seriously.

 Although high priced colleges and graduate schools and $9 billion industries like the NFL may like tests because these tests "don't take very long,". . . "can quantify many people," . . . .and "make assessment seem relatively straightforward," Lehrer writes,

Though the SAT does a decent job of predicting the grades of college freshmen—the test accounts for about 12% of the individual variation in grade point average—it is much less effective at predicting levels of achievement after graduation. Professional academic tests suffer from the same flaw. A study by the University of Michigan Law School, for instance, found that LSAT scores bore virtually no relationship to career success as measured by levels of income, life satisfaction or public service.

Even the NFL Combine is a big waste of time. According to a recent study by economists at the University of Louisville, there's no "consistent statistical relationship" between the results of players at the Combine and subsequent NFL performance.

 Citing Angela Duckworth, a psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania, Lehrer claims that "grit" and "self-control" "consistently predict levels of achievement." He concludes,

The problem, of course, is that students don't reveal their levels of grit while taking a brief test. Grit can only be assessed by tracking typical performance for an extended period. Do people persevere, even in the face of difficulty? How do they act when no one else is watching? Such traits often matter more than raw talent. We hear about them in letters of recommendation, but hard numbers take priority.

The larger lesson is that we've built our society around tests of performance that fail to predict what really matters: what happens once the test is over.

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has asserted, however,  that the Race to the Top tests "will be an absolute game-changer in public education"  Further, and one must cue the original Six Million Dollar Man intro, these tests will "better, smarter assessments -- the kind of tests our teachers want and our students need.” 

Because we have the technology, cue the original Six Million Dollar Man intro again, 

Much of the testing will take place via computer, allowing teachers to get results more quickly. One coalition would use computer adaptive technology so that students at certain skill levels would skip to appropriate questions to more efficiently pinpoint their strengths and weaknesses.

Of course what has happened is that teachers are going to spend time teaching to a test; the kids will get bored; learning won't take place. Yet, under Race to the Top, "thousands of colleges have agreed use them as one indicator that students are ready for entry-level courses." The NFL makes $9 billion dollars a year.  It tests for easily measurable things like speed and strength.   All one needs to access these qualities is a stop watch and a a lot of weights.  Yet the NFL can't find a test to determine an athlete's opportunity for success.

Every bureaucrat who has forced NCLB's or Race to the Top's tests down schools' throats should be forced to read Lehrer's article every day for the next three years.  There won't be a test.  Instead, we'll see if the habit develops the "grit" necessary to understand that tests cannot predict success.

Lebronamania

It's probably just me, but the whole Lebron James mania strikes me as a rip off of a professional wrestling storyline. Please excuse me while I borrow terms and definitions from Wikipedia's pro wrestling glossary.

Right now, Lebron is a "face," the good guy.  He's setting up his turn to "heel," the bad guy by leaving his home town and announcing it on the "worldwide leader in sports."  The one hour ESPN special is "cheap heat" which occurs "when a wrestler (often a heel) incites a negative crowd reaction by insulting the crowd (by insulting the city or a local sports team) or by using a news event as part of his promo." 

If Lebron does in fact go to Miami to play with Chris Bosh and Dwayne Wade, he will create his own stable, "a group of wrestlers within a promotion who have a common element—friendships, either real or storyline, a common manager, or a common storyline—which puts them together as a unit."

Who says art doesn't imitate life?