Valerie Stephan-LeBoeufConcordia University

EDGR 602

Curriculum in Service of College Readiness

“[C]reativity is essentially responsible for all of human progress… is the production of anything... an idea, a tangible product, or a performance… [is] different from what’s been done before… [and] in the workplace [and university] should also be appropriate to some goal or meaning” (citing Teresa Amabile, Goldman, 2015).

“Innovation is the successful implementation of those ideas… [success is dependent upon] innovation… [a]nd innovation depends on creativity...” (citing Teresa Amabile, Goldman, 2015).

Claim: Standardized Assessments require the standardization of

curriculum, and in turn, subdue both the creativity and innovation of U.S. students. Both creativity and innovation are key components for success in all future endeavors.

• In the United States (U.S.), “[t]he college readiness gap reflects the disparity between the skills and knowledge that students gain in high school versus the skills and knowledge that colleges and universities expect” (National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, Southern Regional Education Board (SREB), 2010).

• Despite a history of the application of state education standards in the U.S. (Conley, 2014), “[i]n mathematics literacy and problem solving in 2003, even the highest U.S. achievers (those in the top 10 percent in the United States) were outperformed on average by their OECD counterparts[,]” (Lemke et al., 2004) and, in comparison to their international counterparts, only 61% of U.S. students assessed had obtained grade 10, and 30% of U.S. students assessed were at grade 9 (Lemke et al., 2004, p. 4).

• Post implementation of Common Core Standards in various states in the U.S., “performance of US students flat lined between 2003 to 2012, with even a small decrease with just over 10 percent of students scoring at level five or above in 2003 and 8.8 percent meeting that standard in 2012.” (Craw, 2014).

• “[G]rowth in standardized test performance doesn't buy us cognitive ability” (Kaufman, 2013b).

• In the U.S., “children starting school this year will be retiring in [2074, yet] [n]obody has a clue… what the world will look like in five years' time... [a]nd yet we're meant to be educating them for it” (Robinson, 2006).

Evidence

Warrants

• Only 40% of “first-year college students are “ready for postsecondary studies” in the U.S. (National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, Southern Regional Education Board (SREB), 2010).

• Satisfying state standards for high school graduation, completing college preparation courses, obtaining required grade point averages and SAT/ACT scores does not “ensure college readiness” (National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, Southern Regional Education Board (SREB), 2010).

• Japan, as well as 25 other countries, were considered by the 2003 Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) to be more “mathematically literate” than U.S. students (Lemke et. al., 2004, pp. 13-14).

• As grades and performance on standardized testing do not ensure college readiness, schools must “[integrate] the development of higher level learning skills in the curriculum, specifically in reading, writing, and math” (National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, Southern Regional Education Board (SREB), 2010).

• As intelligence is “diverse, dynamic, and distinct,” educators must embrace the various components of a child, and understand that their learning needs are “diverse, dynamic, and distinct” (Robinson, 2006), and efforts then to standardize expected outcomes in education may neglect the needs of such diversity.

• The future depends on unknown variables, and “concerns [may] be quite different…Will the carrying capacity of the planet support feeding 9 billion people… How will water stress and climate change impact productivity…How will new technologies, such as big data, the internet of things and renewable energy affect business…” (Satell, 2015). Standardized thinking may not provide the answers.

• Readiness standards and expectations do not incorporate key values and characteristics that mark successful behavior in other countries. Specifically, differences between student achievement in Japan and the U.S. may need to start with an examination of the messages conveyed by schools regarding the efforts of hard work, and consider the effects of culture on cognitive abilities and performance.

• “Placement tests” of colleges and universities “vary substantially” both nationally, and “within a state or a postsecondary system” and those “postsecondary placement tests may bear little connection to the high school curriculum or to high school assessments” (National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, Southern Regional Education Board (SREB), 2010).

• According to the University of Michigan (n.d.), “[t]he concepts of ability vs. effort and intrinsic motivation vs. extrinsic motivation may play a key role in the difference in achievements between Japanese and American students [as] Japanese students have been taught to believe that their entire life, not just their academic fate, relies directly upon the amount of work they put into their studies” (University of Michigan, n.d.).

• “[A] an imposed curriculum damages the individual and usurps a basic human right to select one’s own path of development… [l]earners either become alienated from the established curriculum or learn to play the ‘school game’ and thus achieve a hollow success” (Holt cited in Koonce, 2013, p. 23).

• “[O]ur task [as educators] is to educate [the] whole being [of our students], so they can face this future… [as] we may not see this future, but they will… And our job is to help them make something of it” (Robinson, 2006).

Backing for Warrants

Counter Arguments & Rebuttal

1. “At the heart of college readiness is development of the cognitive and metacognitive capabilities of incoming students… [including] analysis, interpretation, precision and accuracy, problem solving, and reasoning” (Conley, 2008).

“[S]tandardized test performance doesn't buy us cognitive ability” (Kaufman, 2013b). Teaching efforts that work to “train changes in the brain” do (Kaufman, 2013a). “[M]otivation and dopamine are associated with greater levels of neuroplasticity” (Kaufman, 2013a), and thus, college readiness programs must focus on the motivations and value systems of students to create new ways of learning, create new brain connections for learning, and to make those “new connections stronger” (Anderson, 2013).

2. “[S]pecific types of content knowledge” is important for college readiness (Conley, 2008).

Although, “many states have emphasized mastery of specific content and performance standards, as shown through grades and statewide assessments; this shift to standards-based performance in the schools generally has not been extended to higher levels of achievement associated with college readiness” (National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, Southern Regional Education Board (SREB), 2010).

3. Saving the “future of our free institutions” is an important consideration when improving the quality of education in the U.S. (Alder cited in Koonce, 2016, p. 28).

The “future of our free institutions” (Alder cited in Koonce, 2006, p. 28) is meaningless, if students are disillusioned instead of inspired. According to Holt, “an imposed curriculum damages the individual and usurps a basic human right to select one’s own path of development” (Koonce, 2016, p. 23). Students need to maintain their “right to control and direct their own learning” or, “[i]f we take from someone his right to decide what he will be curious about, we destroy his freedom of thought” (Holt cited in (Koonce, 2016, p. 29). If we “destroy [a student’s] freedom of thought” (Holt cited in Koonce, 2016, p. 29), we “stigmatize mistakes,” and thus, educate “people out of their creative capacities” (Robinson, 2006).

The U.S. education system should be flexible and adaptable to the learning needs of all students. Standardization in service of college readiness does not adequately prepare students for advance studies and adult employment. In turn, college readiness does not directly correlate with successful employment and professional development and expertise. Curriculum should support and develop individual creativity, innovation, “curiosity, dignity, and sense of identity and worth” (Holt cited in Koonce, 2016, p. 31). Education programs should offer subjects and options within required courses for advancement and graduation that allow students to find relevancy with their own lives and personal communities; as relevancy, once established, will inspire students to become effective contributors to local and global needs.

References

Conley, D. T. (2008). Rethinking College Readiness. New Directions for Higher Education. Volume 2008, 244. Retrieved from

http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ794245.pdf

Conley, D. (2014). The Common Core State Standards: Insight into their development and purpose. Council of Chief State School Officers

(CCSSO). Retrieved from http://www.ccsso.org/Resources/Publications/The_Common_Core_State_Standards

_Insight_into_Their_Development_and_Purpose.html

Craw, J. (2014). Statistic of the month: Trends in the performance of the top performers on PISA 2003 - PISA 2012. Center on

International Education Benchmarking. Retrieved from http://www.ncee.org/2014/03/statistic-of-the-month-trends-in-the-

performance-of-the-top- performers-on-pisa-2003-pisa-2012/

Goleman, D. (2015). Daniel Goleman on creativity and innovation: What’s the difference? Value Walk. Retrieved from

http://www.valuewalk.com/

2015/01/creativity-vs-innovation/

Kaufman, S.B. (2013). Exam_hall.jpg. [background image file]. Retrieved from http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/beautiful-

minds/files/2013/12/exam_hall.jpg

Kaufman, S.B. (2013a). Reasoning training increases brain connectivity associated with high-level cognition. Scientific American.

Retrieved from http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/beautiful-minds/reasoning-training-increases-brain-connectivity-associated-

with-high-level- cognition/

Kaufman, S.B. (2013b). Standardized Achievement Tests: What are they good for? Hint: Not cognitive ability. Scientific American.

Retrieved from http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/beautiful-minds/standardized-achievement-tests-what-are-they-good-for-hint-

not-cognitive- ability/

References

Koonce, G. L. (Ed.). (2016). Taking sides: Clashing views on educational issues-Expanded. (18th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.

Lemke, M., Sen, A., Pahlke, E., Partelow, L., Miller, D., Williams, T., Kastberg, D., Jocelyn, L. (2004). International outcomes of learning in

mathematics literacy and problem solving: PISA 2003 Results from the U.S. perspective. Retrieved from

http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2005/2005003.pdf

National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, and the Southern Regional Education Board (SREB). (2010). Beyond the rhetoric:

Improving college readiness through coherent state policy. Retrieved from http://www.highereducation.org/

reports/college_readiness/index.shtml

Robinson, K. (author/educator). (2006, February). How schools kill creativity. TED Talks. [internet video]. Retrieved from

https://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity/transcript?language=en#t-896200

Satell, G. (2015). To prepare for the future you need to shape it -- or someone else will. Forbes. Retrieved from

http://www.forbes.com/sites/gregsatell/2015/05/22/to-prepare-for-the-future-you-need-to-shape-it-or-someone-else-will/

University of Michigan. (n.d.). Educational systems of Japan and the US. Retrieved from http://sitemaker.umich.edu/

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