Off the Mark: How grades, grades, and rankings can (but don't have to) hinder learning.
Jack Schneider and Ethan L. Hutt
Harvard University Press, 2023, $29.95; Page 296
Reviewed by Adam Tyner
In the years since COVID-19 struck, the grades and test scores on which our education system is based have been constantly disrupted. As the pandemic swept the world, U.S. schools canceled annual standardized testing, college admissions shifted to “test optional,” and students were given a “test-free” test that ensures their grades will not drop regardless of whether they completed assignments or attended virtual classes. A “Hold Harmless” policy was provided. . Most end-of-year testing has returned to K-12 schools in 2021, but much of the “assessment leave” has persisted. Most colleges continue to not require SAT or ACT scores, states are eliminating high school exit exams, and performance standards have fallen to their lowest levels on record. In the name of equity, states and localities are banning penalties for late work, recalibrating grading scales in ways that make passing easier, requiring teachers to assign credit to unsubmitted work, and even assigning credit to unsubmitted work. Grade inflation is being promoted through policies that require grades to be awarded for grades. Graded penalties for cheating.
For this accountability slump, a new book argues that the idea of holding students accountable through measures like grades or test scores is inherently misguided. Written by education school-based researchers Jack Schneider and Ethan Hutt. off the mark It is an ambitious book that combines history, policy analysis, and normative recommendations. The authors assess course grades and external tests as the main “assessment techniques” of modern education systems and argue that the presence of these techniques undermines the goals of education. Although many of the book's recommendations are reasonable, its grandest claims are unsupported or contradicted by research.
The role of grades and testing in our education system needs a better theoretical foundation. Many education writers and researchers assume that these measures are used for a single purpose, such as predicting success after high school, or are important only to specific stakeholders, such as parents. Schneider and Hutt explain that many actions have emerged to fulfill one role, but now have multiple functions and stakeholders. The authors provide a useful mnemonic for classifying stakeholders, explaining that evaluation strategies convey both “short-range” messages to parents and students and “long-range” messages to institutions such as universities.
Unfortunately, short-range messages are often distorted by the time they reach parents. Learning Heroes, a nonprofit organization that helps parents support student success, found in a survey that for all the “good” grades most students receive, only one in four are confident their children are performing at grade level. We found that about 9 out of 10 parents do this. We are actually doing that. Even in an era of extreme learning loss, about four in five parents say their children are taking home most A's and B's, according to the organization's most recent report. This disconnect is dangerous. As Schneider and Hutt point out, “Families want to know how their children are doing so they can encourage, soothe, and intervene as needed.”
The book frames the multiple uses of grades and test scores as a dilemma, noting that the scales are not designed to support all of their current uses. But the authors' concern about long-distance messages is not that they fail to convey useful information. GPA and test scores are among the best predictors of college performance and labor market success, and the authors acknowledge that basing college admissions decisions on grades has one advantage. Their critique is that long-distance messaging raises the stakes for student performance because assessments will follow students far into the future. The authors join previous critics of teacher-assigned grading, including James Coleman and John H. Bishop, in explaining that the classroom dynamics associated with grading lead to grade bullying, “nerd bullying,” and other harmful dynamics between students and teachers, and between students. Point out how it can help you. And their colleagues.
However, the authors' assumption that learning is hindered because students have a greater stake in academic performance runs counter to the work of previous critics. In fact, the authors make claims about grades and test scores harming student motivation that are either unsubstantiated, largely contradicted by research, or are missing analysis of the social dynamics surrounding grades and test scores identified by researchers.
The authors' antipathy toward using grades and test scores as motivational factors stems from an unclear theory of learning. This is a version of Pop Romanticism, often attributed to philosopher Jean-Jacque Rousseau, but better expressed in self-help and educational writing. Over the past few decades, such as Daniel Pink. drive And Alfie Cohn's punished by reward. Pop romantics argue that the use of incentives in education undermines students' intrinsic desire to learn. Psychologists, including Richard Ryan and Edward Deci, cited by Schneider and Hutt, discovered in the 1970s that incentives can backfire under certain conditions. But pop romantics reduced these findings to a simple dichotomy. In other words, intrinsic motivation is good and extrinsic motivation is bad. In fact, psychologists have proven that educators can utilize both types of motivation. Many studies show that students benefit when they are held accountable for their academic performance, whether through teachers who assign strict grades, large cash incentives for academic success, or classroom reward systems. off the mark It does not even address this body of research, let alone engage with it to synthesize new approaches to evaluation.
Schneider and Hutt also advise against grading temporary assignments such as homework. “If students are to receive clues about the kinds of things that matter in school, those clues must point to substantive knowledge and skills,” they argue. But one might object that accountability for short-term performance serves a valuable purpose. Grading such assignments can help motivate students and prevent procrastination. Without short-term goals, even highly motivated students may wait until the end of the semester to prepare for final exams. By ignoring the substantive academic framework that links students' academic motivation and responsibility, Schneider and Hutt's analysis remains undertheorized and incomplete.
The authors' recommendations for change include both high-quality proposals and less compelling ideas. They make three main proposals for reform. In other words, it allows students to “overwrite” previous grades. A basic assessment of a “common set of performance-based tasks.” . . aligned to a common set of competencies”; And by making the report card “double-clickable,” it deepens the information it conveys. As an example of the latter, they recommend the work of the Mastery Transcript Consortium, which places students' secondary school experiences in a format similar to a “high school student's LinkedIn.”
The concept of overwriting grades provides a distinction without much of a difference. That's because the report card already reflects the student's observable progress (or lack thereof) in each subject he or she takes. If a student gets a C in Algebra I and an A in Algebra II, progress is evident. Students are free to highlight this, and college admissions officers are free to consider it. Making grades “overwriteable” adds another mechanism to inflate grades while encouraging students to procrastinate. An Algebra II student might conclude, “Later, we’ll figure out how to factor polynomials.”
The second suggestion of grading based on “performance-based assignments” is similar to using portfolio assessments. This concept is controversial, but if it were part of a “system that integrates both grades and portfolios” and some external testing, it would focus students on developing skills they may miss in other assessments while conveying more qualitative information to stakeholders. You can encourage them to do it. In other words, digital portfolios can add real value if they complement existing valuation techniques rather than replace them. Schneider and Hutt point to Advanced Placement (AP) and the International Baccalaureate (IBA) as examples of programs that successfully combine multiple assessments, including student assignments for at least some subjects.
For the third recommendation, which integrates information from student transcripts and digital portfolios, the Mastery Transcript Consortium is already a model for transitioning traditional transcript material to a format that better integrates GPA and assessment results for AP and college admissions exams. Can be used with new qualitative elements.
Key reasons for analysis off the mark Even though the authors view students as rational and strategic people, they argue against leveraging these qualities to encourage better learning. They provide no evidence that relying solely on intrinsic motivation can solve today's skyrocketing problem of student disinterest in schoolwork and absenteeism. “Address extrinsic motivation,” they write in the recommendations chapter. [by removing stakes attached to grades] At the very least, it opens the door to conversation about how to foster intrinsic motivation.” Dismissing the idea that education systems should include both types of motivation, the authors recommend “minimizing as much as possible the use of carrots and sticks” due to the dichotomy.
Off the menu are reforms to address the shortcomings of current accountability measures, such as improving standardized tests to rely less on multiple-choice questions or separating instruction and assessment to disrupt morally dangerous dynamics between students and teachers. Both can help solve the problems Schneider and Hutt identify in their book. Unfortunately, too often authors' distorted views of human motivation lead their analyzes astray.
Adam Tyner is national research director at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute. He is co-author of a recent policy brief. Think again: Do “fair” grades help students?
The post How to Not Evaluate a Situation appeared first on Education Next.