Letter-2013-06-10
7
11 June 2013 Mr. Arne Duncan, Secretary U.S. Department of Education 400 Maryland Avenue, SW Washington, D.C. 20202 Dear Secretary Duncan, The US Nati onal Commission on Ma thematics Instr uction (US NC/MI) is a committee of the National Academies. Our commission thus advises Congress and the Nation on mathematics teaching, both nationally and internationally. We are writing to you as individuals, whose views reflect our service on the USNC/MI, to share our vision for mathematics teaching and to advocate for policies that will support this vision. We would like mathematics teaching—from PreKindergarten through college and beyond—to become a vigorous, vibrant profession that is designed for continuous improvement. From our work with educators in other countries we are finding that systems that support teachers’ autonomy and professionalism, set a high bar to entry into the teaching profession, and foster ongoing development within learning communities produce an environment in which teaching and learning thrive. We think that in this country, systems should be developed—or expanded—in which teachers collaborate, examine and discuss their work, use and build on each other’s ideas, and seek to work with their peers to improve the quality of their methods and ideas. Such an environment could allow for excellence to be achieved and demonstrated in various ways. It would push the teaching field forward, in much the same way as mathematics and science make progress by sharing and building on ideas. It would create a vigorous culture in the same way that the sciences do: where the respect of one’s peers is valued and the possibility of earning this respect can be done in one’s own way. Of course, the ultimate motivation for teachers is more and deeper learning by students. We have learned from Chinese teachers that “to learn continually” is a central motto in education, that “superrank” teachers analyze and improve the curriculum, and that testing is viewed as less critical than in the U.S. (U.S. National Commission on Mathematics Instruction, 2010). We have learned from Korean teachers that they have a strong and impressive teacher research culture, and that their system supports and nurtures such a culture. Evidence in favor of developing systems in which teaching is an autonomous profession with a high bar to entry also comes from 1
-
Upload
jhicksmath -
Category
Documents
-
view
214 -
download
0
Transcript of Letter-2013-06-10
7/28/2019 Letter-2013-06-10
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/letter-2013-06-10 1/7
11 June 2013
Mr. Arne Duncan, SecretaryU.S. Department of Education400 Maryland Avenue, SWWashington, D.C. 20202
Dear Secretary Duncan,
The US National Commission on Mathematics Instruction (USNC/MI) is acommittee of the National Academies. Our commission thus advisesCongress and the Nation on mathematics teaching, both nationally andinternationally. We are writing to you as individuals, whose viewsreflect our service on the USNC/MI, to share our vision for mathematicsteaching and to advocate for policies that will support this vision. Wewould like mathematics teaching—from PreKindergarten throughcollege and beyond—to become a vigorous, vibrant profession that is
designed for continuous improvement.
From our work with educators in other countries we are finding thatsystems that support teachers’ autonomy and professionalism, set ahigh bar to entry into the teaching profession, and foster ongoingdevelopment within learning communities produce an environment inwhich teaching and learning thrive. We think that in this country,systems should be developed—or expanded—in which teacherscollaborate, examine and discuss their work, use and build on eachother’s ideas, and seek to work with their peers to improve the qualityof their methods and ideas. Such an environment could allow for
excellence to be achieved and demonstrated in various ways. It wouldpush the teaching field forward, in much the same way asmathematics and science make progress by sharing and building onideas. It would create a vigorous culture in the same way that thesciences do: where the respect of one’s peers is valued and thepossibility of earning this respect can be done in one’s own way. Of course, the ultimate motivation for teachers is more and deeperlearning by students.
We have learned from Chinese teachers that “to learn continually” is acentral motto in education, that “superrank” teachers analyze and
improve the curriculum, and that testing is viewed as less critical thanin the U.S. (U.S. National Commission on Mathematics Instruction,2010). We have learned from Korean teachers that they have a strongand impressive teacher research culture, and that their systemsupports and nurtures such a culture.
Evidence in favor of developing systems in which teaching is anautonomous profession with a high bar to entry also comes from
1
7/28/2019 Letter-2013-06-10
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/letter-2013-06-10 2/7
Finland, where systemic changes led to improved teaching andlearning over the last several decades. While the U.S. has intensifiedstandardized testing and accountability since the 1990s, “Finland atthat time emphasized teacher professionalism, school-basedcurriculum, trust-based educational leadership, and school
collaboration through networking.” (Sahlberg, 2011). Indeed,Sahlberg’s main message is that there is another way to improve education systems. This includesimproving the teaching force, limiting student testing to anecessary minimum, placing responsibility and trust beforeaccountability, and handing over school- and district-levelleadership to education professionals. These are commoneducation policy themes in some of the high performingcountries—Finland among them—in the 2009 InternationalProgramme for Student Assessment (PISA) of the OECD… .
(Sahlberg, 2011)Finland’s education system fits with Jal Mehta’s vision, which hecontrasts with our own current system:
Teaching requires a professional model, like we have inmedicine, law, engineering, accounting, architecture and manyother fields. In these professions, consistency of quality iscreated less by holding individual practitioners accountable andmore by building a body of knowledge, carefully training peoplein that knowledge, requiring them to show expertise before theybecome licensed, and then using their professions’ standards to
guide their work.
By these criteria, American education is a failed profession. There is no widely agreed-upon knowledge base, training is brief or nonexistent, the criteria for passing licensing exams are muchlower than in other fields, and there is little continuousprofessional guidance. (Mehta, 2013)
We believe it is critical for teaching to be a respected profession andwe agree with Sahlberg that “[a]s long as the practice of teachers isnot trusted and they are not respected as professionals, young talent
is unlikely to seek teaching as their lifelong career anywhere. Or if theydo, they will leave teaching early because of lack of a respectfulprofessional working environment” (Sahlberg, 2011). We areconcerned that—as stated in a teacher’s widely circulated resignationletter—“[w]e have become increasingly evaluation and not knowledgedriven” (Strauss, 2013).
The need for professional, collaborative communities of teachers is
2
7/28/2019 Letter-2013-06-10
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/letter-2013-06-10 3/7
7/28/2019 Letter-2013-06-10
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/letter-2013-06-10 4/7
experience. (Ryan & Brown, 2005)
In their meta-analysis of 128 well-controlled experiments exploring theeffects of extrinsic rewards on intrinsic motivation, Deci, Koestner, andRyan (1999) found a “clear and consistent” picture:
In general, tangible rewards had a significant negative effect onintrinsic motivation for interesting tasks, and this effect showedup with participants ranging from preschool to college, withinteresting activities ranging from word games to constructionpuzzles, and with various rewards ranging from dollar bills tomarshmallows. (Deci, Koetsner, & Ryan, 1999)
Teaching is an inherently complex, interesting, and creative activitybecause it involves knowing ideas and ways of thinking and engagingothers with those ideas and ways of thinking. Thus, according to theresearch on motivation, improving teaching will require work
environments that foster intrinsic (or autonomous) motivation.Motivation research further indicates that “the experiences of autonomy, as well as of competence and relatedness, are important foreffective performance and psychological health and well-being” (Deci& Ryan, 2008).
We doubt that students’ learning gains will outweigh the negativeeffects to the teaching profession of test-based accountability.According to the National Research Council’s Committee on Incentivesand Test-Based Accountability in Public Education, “the availableevidence does not give strong support for the use of test-based
incentives to improve education” (National Research Council, 2011, p.91). Furthermore,
The research to date suggests that the benefits of test-basedincentive programs over the past two decades have been quitesmall. Although the available evidence is limited, it is notinsignificant. The incentive programs that have been tried haveinvolved a number of different incentive designs and substantialnumbers of schools, teachers, and students. We focused onstudies that allowed us to draw conclusions about the causaleffects of incentive programs and found a significant body of
evidence that was carefully constructed. Unfortunately, theguidance offered by this body of evidence is not encouragingabout the ability of incentive programs to reliably producemeaningful increases in student achievement—except inmathematics for elementary school students. (National ResearchCouncil, 2011)
Looking at the effects of test-based accountability from an
4
7/28/2019 Letter-2013-06-10
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/letter-2013-06-10 5/7
international perspective, we also do not find support for such asystem:
Are those education systems where competition, choice, andtest-based accountability have been the main drivers of
educational change showing progress in internationalcomparisons? Using the PISA database to construct such acomparison, a suggestive answer emerges. Most notably, theUnited States, England, New Zealand, Japan, and some parts of Canada and Australia can be used as benchmarks. … The trendof students’ performance in mathematics in all test-basedaccountability-policy nations is similar— it is in decline, in cycleafter cycle, between 2000 and 2006. (Sahlberg, 2011)
None of the above implies that standardized tests for students are bador wrong. The issue is how tests are used. Using test results forinformational purposes in a trusting, collaborative environment isentirely different from using test results to monitor, evaluate, reward,or punish teachers. In this matter, we would be wise to heedCampbell’s Law and his observations about test scores:
The more any quantitative social indicator is used for socialdecision-making, the more subject it will be to corruptionpressures and the more apt it will be to distort and corrupt thesocial processes it is intended to monitor. (Campbell, 1976,2011, p. 34)
… when test scores become the goal of the teaching process,
they both lose their value as indicators of educational status anddistort the educational process in undesirable ways. (Campbell,1976, 2011 p. 35)
Near the end of its report, the National Research Council’s Committeeon Incentives and Test-Based Accountability in Public Education stated:
Our recommendations, accordingly, call for policy makers tosupport experimentation with rigorous evaluation and to allowmidcourse correction of policies when evaluation suggests suchcorrection is needed. (National Research Council, 2011)
We think that the time has come for a midcourse correction. InSingapore, there is the motto “teach less, learn more;” in the U.S., weneed to “test less, learn more.” We have argued that test-basedaccountability stands to have negative effects on teaching as aprofession and that there are better ways to improve teaching. Werespectfully urge changes in policy to support a strong and vibrantmathematics teaching profession.
5
7/28/2019 Letter-2013-06-10
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/letter-2013-06-10 6/7
Sincerely,
Sybilla Beckmann,University of Georgia 1
Janine Remillard,University of PennsylvaniaGail Burrill,Michigan State University James BartaUtah State UniversityRoger Howe (NAS), Yale UniversityMyong-Hi (Nina) Kim,SUNY College at Old WestburyBernard Madison,University of Arkansas, FayettevilleSara Normington,Catlin Gabel School James Roznowski,Delta CollegePatrick (Rick) Scott, New Mexico Higher Education DepartmentPadmanabhan Seshaiyer,George Mason University
References
Bryk, A. S., Sebring, P. B., Allensworth, E., Luppescu, S., & Easton, J. Q.
(2010). Organizing Schools for Improvement, Lessons fromChicago. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
Campbell, D. (1976, 2011). Assessing the Impact of Planned SocialChange. Journal of MultiDisciplinary Evaluation, 7(15), 3 - 43.
Darling-Hammond, L., Wei, R. C., Andree, A., Richardson, N., &Orphanos, S. (2009). Professional Learning in the LearningProfession: A Status Report on Teacher Development in theUnited States and Abroad. Dallas, TX: National Staff Development Council and The School Redesign Network at
Stanford University.
Deci, E. L., Koestner, R., & Ryan, R. (1999). A Meta-Analytic Review of Experiments Examining the Effects of Extrinsic Rewards onIntrinsic Motivation. Psychological Bulletin, 125(6), 627 - 668.
Deci, E. L., & Ryan, R. M. (2008). Facilitating Optimal Motivation andPsychological Well-Being Across Life's Domains. CanadianPsychology, 49(1), 14 - 23.
Gagne, M., & Deci, E. L. (2005). Self-determination theory and workmotivation. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 26, 331 - 362.
Mehta, J. (2013, April 12). Teachers: Will We Ever Learn? New York Times. Retrieved from:http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/13/opinion/teachers-will-we-
1 Please address correspondence to Sybilla Beckmann,[email protected] or Department of Mathematics, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia 30602.
6
7/28/2019 Letter-2013-06-10
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/letter-2013-06-10 7/7
ever-learn.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
National Research Council. (2011). Incentives and Test-Based Accountability in Education. Committee on Incentives and Test-Based Accountability in Public Education, M. Hout and S.W.Elliott, Editors. Board on Testing and Assessment, Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
Ryan. R. M., & Brown. K. W. (2005). Legislating competence: Themotivational impact of high stakes testing as an educationalreform. In C. Dweck & A. E. Elliot (Eds.). Handbook of competence (pp. 354-374) New York: Guilford Press.
Sahlberg, P. (2011). Finnish Lessons: What Can the World Learn fromEducational Change in Finland? New York: Teachers CollegePress.
Strauss, V. (2013, April 6). Teacher’s resignation letter: ‘Myprofession… no longer exists.’ Washington Post. Retrieved from:http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2013/04/06/teachers-resignation-letter-my-profession-no-longer-exists/
U.S. National Commission on Mathematics Instruction. (2010). TheTeacher Development Continuum in the United States and China:Summary of a Workshop. Ana Ferreras and Steve Olson,Rapporteurs; Ester Sztein, Editor; National Research Council.Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
7
