St. wrote:
> "andrel" <a_l### [at] hotmailcom> wrote in message 
> news:47E### [at] hotmailcom...
>> Mike Raiford wrote:
>>> Jim Charter wrote:
>>>
>>>> I lasted just four days tutoring in the "No child left behind" effort.
>>>>
>>>> Personally, I've never looked back.
>>> Hmmm. 'No child left behind' My wife was going on about all of the 
>>> paperwork she was required to file due to this act. I jokingly called it 
>>> the 'No Piece of Paper Left Behind' act.
>>>
>>> She was telling me yesterday, that by some year (I think 4 years from 
>>> now, 2012) all students must pass standardized testing, or teachers could 
>>> lose their jobs. I replied by stating that it was asinine to think that 
>>> the teacher's performance should be judged by the student's performance 
>>> on a test. There are MANY more factors that go into the performance of a 
>>> child in addition to the teacher. You can't help those who are not 
>>> willing to be helped. Parents who refuse to be involved in their child's 
>>> education and well being are far more detrimental to that child's ability 
>>> to learn than a teacher who gave her best effort in the classroom.
>> Solutions:
>> - pass on poor (performing) students to other schools
>> - try to be more attractive to students from good neighbourhoods/wealthy 
>> parents.
>> - let the poor performing fail the year before the test
>> - proclaim the poor performing students ill during the test period
>> - take many disciplinary actions for futile offenses until they 
>> 'voluntary' leave school before the test.
>> - ...
>>
>> At least the first four options are actually used in some form in the 
>> Netherlands to increase the rating of the school.
> 
>     I would say: Introduce competition between schools much like our 
> football leagues here in the UK. Give the pupils something to be proud of 
> and to work for - a challenge. Have league tables. Give them incentive/s. If 
> they are in a school that does *very* well, then that pupil has a better 
> option of getting a good job and earning more money when they leave. If the 
> school doesn't do well, then the pupils are on the scrap-heap and not the 
> teachers.
> 
>    I wish that was in place when I was young.
> 
It might seem a good idea, but the problem is that humans are too 
intelligent. If you are introducing a competition or grading or whatever 
based on a numerical score, teachers and schools are going to optimize 
that number. Most of the ratings that I have seen have some perverse way 
of increasing the score in a way that works totally against the intended 
objective. Base a score on the performance of pupils and schools will 
try to get rid of less performing students as soon as possible. It'll 
result in a system where the weaker pupils get less and less education. 
Another example is that the government here put a fine on too much delay 
for trains. Guess what happened. They changed the timetables to include 
waiting time at big stations, connecting trains don't wait for a 
slightly delayed train and they take trains out of the schedule as soon 
as the delay gets too big (the rule states that only running trains 
count). Result: more trains on time according to schedule and 
significant more delays for the passengers. Moral: never ever assign 
numerical scores to performance. No really, don't.

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