WEAC Research Paper

Setting the Record Straight: Confronting the Myth of Public School Failure

The national debate about the quality of American public education has continued unabated since the publication of A Nation At Risk in 1983. Fueled in large part by new international economic realities, by a domestic economy based on traditional production models, and by changing domestic demographics, the critics have sought solutions to these challenging conditions by blaming schools and educators. The data cited by critics of public schools were accepted at face value until the late 1980's. Since then, a variety of research reports have revealed that much of the criticism has been simplistic and has distorted and misrepresented the conditions of public education.

This is not to suggest that all is well in American public schools or that improvement in student achievement is not to be desired. Harold Hodgkinson, director of the Center for Demographic Policy, offers these observations:

The top 20% of American high school graduates are world class and getting better. They graduate from colleges and universities in unprecedented numbers and write 40% of all research articles in the world.
The next 40% of high school graduates are mostly capable of graduating from college; some need remediation in writing or science or mathematics but they can and do make it.
The lowest 40% of our students is in bad shape. Although most stay in school, they are not very successful there or after they leave school (p.622-623).

The Myth of Public School Failure

Although the criticism of public education ranges over a large number of issues, it tends to fall into one of four categories.

Public schools are criticized because they fare poorly in international comparisons or because the national data reveal a broad decline in student achievement over the last 25 years.
A second category of criticism holds that there is no linkage between school spending and student achievement, and therefore increasing the per pupil expenditure will not improve school quality.
The third category of criticism argues that the poor quality of American schools is responsible for the nation's failures in the international marketplace.
Finally, there is the myth that, in general, private schools do a better job of preparing students.

The discussion which follows will address only the issue of declining/poor student achievement. The conventional public wisdom holds that declining standardized test scores and unfavorable international comparisons of student achievement are indicators of a decline in public school quality. Three major data sources cited by the critics of public schools are discussed below.

International Assessment of Educational Progress (IAEP)

The IAEP data purport to show that the achievement of American students compares unfavorably with that of students in other industrialized countries. Comparing international achievement levels is very difficult, as evidenced by the debates which have raged among testing experts.

Berliner (1993) has raised a series of questions which illustrate the difficulty of making comparisons of school quality across cultures: Do Americans want their children to experience childhoods like those of Japanese, Korean, Chinese or East Indian children? Have the students spent the same amount of time practicing the skills that are to be tested? Are the samples of students selected to take the test in each country equivalent? Have students in each country had the opportunity to learn the content on which they are tested? Does the culture in which the student test takers reside value their commitment to do well on the test?

Several weaknesses of the IAEP data are obvious. The comparability of the student samples has been questioned since more American students remain in school for longer periods of time and are therefore part of the high school test sample. In other countries, only the top students remain in school and are tested. Furthermore, IAEP data do not control for time spent in school, nor are the tests well aligned with the curricula American students study. Differing educational structures and practices are obviously the consequence of varying values and social judgments.

Could Wisconsin replicate the educational experiences of students in Asia or western Europe without replicating the larger culture of those regions? Probably not. Could Wisconsin schools choose to teach Algebra earlier in the mathematical sequence? Of Course! Could the Wisconsin school year be lengthened by twenty days? Certainly! Educational decisions are made for many reasons; not all of those decisions are driven by international comparisons.

There are positive international data which are seldom discussed. The United States has the highest percentage of 24 year olds in the world graduating from a four year college. Its colleges produce the highest percentage of technical degrees and it has the most gender-balanced field of degree recipients (Carson, et al., p.287). The data on female graduation is especially striking. Twenty-four percent of American 24 year- old females graduate from college, while the figures for Japan and Germany are 12 and 10%, respectively (Kirst, p.614). Finally, 40% of all research articles in the world are published by U.S. scholars; no other nation produces more than 7% (Hodgkinson, p.622).

Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT)

Critics of public schools often cite the decline in SAT scores over the last 25-30 years as evidence of the weakness of public schools. It is true that SAT average test scores declined between the late 1960s and the early 1980s. Mean scores began a gradual rise in 1985.

Several observations can be made regarding the usefulness of the SAT as an indicator of school quality.

SAT scores are misleading as indicators of achievement trends for two reasons. First, the sample of students taking the SAT is self-selected. It is not selected by the College Board to represent all American students. The test is taken by only 40% of American students (10% in Wisconsin), primarily by those who plan on attending college. Since the largest achievement gains over the past twenty years have occurred among the lowest achieving students, who do not take the SAT, those gains are not reflected in the SAT data (Grissmer, et al., p.21).

A second concern with SAT data is that the sample size and composition of test takers has changed significantly over time. Thus, the yearly samples are not comparable. For example, the original SAT test was normed in 1941 on a mostly white male middle class sample of 11,000 students bound for Ivy League Colleges. Today's test population reflects the diversity of the population in race, class and gender.

Between 1960 and 1985, approximately half of the decline in SAT scores can be attributed to a more diverse population of some one million test takers. The real decline in scores is about 5% which, according to researchers at the Sandia National Laboratory, is due primarily to the changing sample mix (Jaeger, p. 120).

Despite the evidence, public opinion continues to rely on the SAT score as an indicator of school quality. Several reasons may explain this misplaced emphasis. Since 40% of American students take the SAT and it is an exam of high personal stakes (college admission), families tend to view the results as a proxy of public school quality rather than as an estimate of potential student success in college.

There is also a strong tendency for people to embrace "singe cause" explanations and they tend to choose those which resemble the effect. It is much easier to blame the school for declines in quality rather than to embrace the research on achievement which repeatedly shows that family and other demographic characteristics have stronger effects on test scores than do individual schools or teachers (Grissmer, p.23).

National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP)

The National Assessment of Educational Progress has been administered by the Department of Education for more than twenty years. National representative samples of students at ages 9, 13, and 17 have been tested in many areas, including reading, mathematics, science and writing. Tests were given at four-year intervals in the ?70s and ?80s and have been given more frequently since.

The NAEP data permit comparisons of American student achievement over time. The twenty year results of NAEP testing do not confirm the public's conclusions drawn from SAT results that there has been a marked decline in student achievement. In fact, scores for each student age group on reading and mathematics tests were higher in 1990 than they were in 1973. Although a gap still exists between the scores of black and Hispanic students and those of non-Hispanic white students, the size of that gap has been significantly reduced since 1973 (Grissmer, 1994, p. 16).

Although NAEP data do not give evidence of achievement decline over twenty years, this does not mean that we should be complacent. NAEP scores are reported for three achievement levels - basic, proficient, and advanced. Although many students meet the "basic achievement" level (60% in mathematics and 75% in reading), most students fall far short of achieving at the advanced level. Among high school seniors, only 2% achieved at the advanced level in mathematics while 3% reached that level in reading on the 1992 NAEP tests (Stedman, p. 219).

Toward A Rational Policy of School Improvement

The data on student achievement present two challenges.

They do not support the public perception of public school decline or failure as defined by that data.
They also reveal the difficulty of isolating those variables which have the greatest effect on student achievement.

If student achievement is to improve in Wisconsin, rational decision making must prevail. There must be an honest recognition of the dimensions of school success. These include the community's definition of and commitment to explicit educational goals as well as a recognition that the quality of life in that community will finally determine whether the schools can succeed in their mission. The evidence of the impact of child and family well-being on student achievement is overwhelming and can not be ignored if there is to a serious commitment to improve the level of student achievement. Critics of public schools will not be taken seriously as long as they choose to ignore the environments in which schools must function.

References

Berliner, David C. "Mythology and the American System of Education." Phi Delta Kappan (April 1993): 632-640.

Carson, C. C., Huelskamp, R.M., and Woodall, T. D. "Perspectives on Education in America: Sandia National Laboratories." The Journal of Educational Research (May/June 1993): 259-310.

Grissmer, David W. et al. Student Achievement and the Changing American Family. Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 1994.

Hodgkinson, Harold. "American Education: The Good, the Bad, And the Task." Phi Delta Kappan (April 1993): 619-623.

Jaeger, Richard M. "World Class Standards, Choice, and Privatization: Weak Measurement Serving Presumptive Policy." Phi Delta Kappan (October 1992): 118-128.

Kirst, Michael W. "Strengths and Weaknesses of American Education." Phi Delta Kappan (April 1993): 613 - 618.

Stedman, Lawrence C. "The Condition of Education: Why School Reformers Are On the Right Track." Phi Delta Kappan (November 1993): 215-225.

This document was prepared by the WEAC Professional Development & Training Division.