EDUCATION: Rethinking Accountability For K-12 Education, Post-Pandemic.

Some folks have tried to suggest that the COVID-19 underlines the importance of testing and therefor underlines the importance of our old high stakes testing system. In fact, it does the opposite. COVID-19 testing is a simple binary; do you have the virus or not? But it is absurd to suggest that a single standardized math and reading test can somehow answer a binary question, “Is this child well-educated or not?” Even ed reform fans have known for a while that the big standardized test does not deliver useful information. The pandemic reminds us that when it comes to testing, you need something that provides a clear answer to a clear question.

It’s time to scrap the big standardized high-stakes test entirely, and replace them with a system that would provide real accountability.

I think the pandemic underscores the value of homeschooling.