Seattle Teachers Boycott Standardized Test

Garfield High School teachers have recently received a lot of attention due to the unexpected support received after the boycott of the MAP (Measures of Academic Progress) standardized test. The teachers argue that the test does not accurately portray their students’ progress, for it is not aligned to the school’s curriculum. The students, aware that they are not receiving a “ valid grade” simply focus on racing through the test, while the ones who are being judged for their performance – the teachers – are not given a fair assessment of their work. Contrary to what some may believe, the educators do not claim to be against all tests, but are very much against a test not aligned specifically to their curriculum and that may have been adopted for reasons other than the best interest of the students; the test was adopted for four million dollars.

Standardized tests are clearly flawed representations of students’ progress, for it does not clearly portray that he or she has fully understood and interpreted the content that is actually being taught in the classroom. The conflict with standardized tests has been occurring for years, but it has just recently been acted upon; while other teachers and various school districts might share this feeling, they might not be willing to take a stand onto what they truly believe is the correct thing to do. While critics of the boycott state that teachers at Garfield High are simply afraid of accountability for their students’ performance upon what they have learned in the classroom, teachers state just the opposite:

“None of us is against accountability or rigor, we just want assessments that reflect what we teach in the classroom and that mold our students into successful participants in our various communities.” 

                                                                 – Jesse Hagopian, spokesperson for the boycott.

Teachers are demanding nothing more than what they should be awarded; assessments in the classroom that are properly adapted to the curriculum, thus accurately interpreting students’ progress.

When talking about possible solutions, some suggest getting rid of tests in general, and instead keeping a regular portfolio where the students would gather year-round work, keeping track of their constant development. I, however, believe tests are necessary for the benefit of the students, for it is the only viable way to fully check if a taught subject is fully understood or if it needs more review. It is both the students’ and the teachers’ job to ensure a concrete understanding of what is taught in the classroom, and Garfield’s High School called-for boycott is doing nothing but demanding circumstances that will make those conditions ideal. In a time where individuality is slowly being taken away from us, we need to remember that not everyone is the same – whether it be in or out of the classroom – and begin to build around that. 

College.

College is a subject I have spend a lot of time thinking about; which college will I attend? What will I end up majoring on?  What will my experience will be like? I am only in my sophomore year of high school, but these are all definitely questions I revisit in my mind daily. Given all the time and hard work that is put into the college application process over all – including efforts prior to actually submitting your application – it definitely builds our expectations on what those initial four years of our lives are going to be like. Despite being fluent in English and having studied in an International School for eight years, knowing I wanted to go to college in the United States for a considerably long period of time – taking in consideration my age – being an International Student is definitely on my list of concerns. This is not only because of the language, but the overall “cultural shock” that I might experience; unlike many of my classmates that I have had over these eight years, I have only lived in one country and one city all my life, leading me to believe that, although I will definitely be able to adapt to my new lifestyle, it might also be harder and take longer for me to do so. Going back to my daily college-related thoughts, my main concern is definitely centered on what I want to study. For me, this question might be way too nerve raking for being about five years early, but it is no doubt something that everyone in my age group thinks about – I hope. As my teachers have continuously told me, it is not something to loose sleep over, especially not when you’re sixteen. 

This brings me to one of the main reasons why I do want to attend college in the United States. I do not have to go into college having my mind set on what I want to study, but I have the opportunity to take various courses over two years, being then able to find something that I am truly passionate about. Being an Academic Leader will give us a head start on many things throughout our lives, including college applications; by knowing what college recruiters are interested to know about you, and things that they are looking for in prospective students will help filter all of the information that you have to offer. Being aware and know what you want and are looking for in the college of your choice will cause a good impression that you have looked into the institution and what they have to offer you. Being Academic Leaders will help us be able to correctly transmit our thoughts in an elaborate manner, allowing colleges to receive the information that we want them to have about us. As seen, college is something that, despite not being in our immediate future, is on our minds constantly, driving us to strive for our best while building and preparing for the college experience. 

Intellectual Leaders - How Will They Help?

Creating academically sophisticated, intellectual leaders may help prevent people from taking advantage of others in several different ways; first, intellectual leaders will not only rely on their authority and power, but will have true leadership skills, which will lead them to benefit the entire society, as opposed to only benefitting themselves. “Leadership is the process of persuasion or example by which an individual (or leadership team) induces a group to pursue objectives held by the leader or shared by the leader and his or her followers.” (Gardner) According to this definition, we can see that a leader has not only influence on his or her actions, but also plays a very influential role in the lives of his or her followers, having a great effect on the society in which one lives. This is something a lot of people do not consider about when thinking about leadership – they instead focus on their power and authority, as represented by the image below. 

With intellectual, academically sophisticated leaders, a noticeably stronger democratic society would be built, for the people would be a lot more engaged in the decisions being made for the community, wanting to assist and make a difference for the better of the society as a whole. The individuals in the community would not only be concerned with their well being, but would want to create a system in which the entire society is able to benefit from. Rather than being persuaded into political arguments without properly being able to fathom them, people would be engaged and aware of their government’s actions and decisions, hence constructing a sophisticated and stronger democratic society. 

Academic Knowledge and Manipulation

Academic knowledge, as we all know, can easily provide individuals with advantages in certain situations, such as an academic discussion or debate; it can also offer people the idea of superiority over others. This can lead to a different posture, and different ways of seeing and approaching various situations. For example, having a superior education will a lot of times lead people to the conclusion you are credible, and hence believe everything you say, giving you great opportunity to manipulate and take advantage of their trust. Supporting your opinion with "evidence," as some might call it, may add, when presented the right way, even more credibility to your argument. However, once you look closely into the ideas and arguments people have used, they are not always being used correctly, sometimes corrupting the argument rather than supporting it. As we have read in the article by Jared Diamond, "Romney Hasn't Done His Homework," presidential candidate Mitt Romney can be served as an example. Diamond claims that in one of his speeches, delivered in Jerusalem, Romney made a clear misinterpretation of the view points and statements made in his book, "Guns, Germs and Steel," leading Jared Diamond to discredit the fact that the candidate had even truly read it. 

Under the scenario that my work were being used for the manipulation of others, as scientist and author Jared Diamond stated has been done to him, my response - would I have the same influence and resources as Diamond - might not be different from his. I would simply like to state the true meaning and objective of my work, and make people aware of the mistake that had been made. 

What is Academic Leadership?

In the first couple of weeks, through articles and class discussions, we have been able to understand more about the course and its goals. To me, the concept of Academic Leadership revolves greatly around understanding what true leadership is, and, through that, being able to turn activities and topics that we really enjoy learning more about, and turning them into academic subjects. It has been emphasized to us that anything we enjoy – as non-academic as it may seem – can easily be turned into something academic, which we will be working more on on our individual projects. As the video linked below states, for me, academic leadership broadly involves "looking beyond the leadership of the institution to ways people think more broadly about their academic work." In my perspective, this means expanding our knowledge on what "academic" really means, and how we can relate other things that we are interested and passionate about, turning them into academic topics that we are eager to work on.  

For the purpose of this post, watch the video below from  0:00 to 0:46

A topic that I have found myself being eager to learn is psychology; I have always been interested to learn more about how our mind works, and what leads people to do the things they do. Last year, in our English class, after watching some of Sam Harris’ lectures, we discussed the topic of religion and free will. These caused great controversy in our class, for everyone either strongly agreed or disagreed with Harris’ argument. Since we only looked into a couple of topics, I would be very interested to look into other concepts that have been presented, not focusing only on Sam Harris, but also integrating other psychologists, such as Steven Pinker. I think it would be extremely intriguing to look at various different arguments and perspectives, being then able to make my own conclusions and sophisticated opinion on the different topics being analyzed. However, I do have other interests that are very different from this specific topic, and I will definitely have to ponder more on the subject in order to make the correct decision for my Individual Project.