Alternate Assessment rant by Teacher on Youtube:

[Smarmie Doofus]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4vXzPtYvtg

Believe me... he's going *easy*. Still, I'll wager New York's AA is even more bizarre, more bureuacratic... and it's own AA conceived by minds at least equally disturbed as those of the Georgians that produced this.

Your tax money at work, citizens.

And parents: guess who's teaching you're kids while teacher is fumbling thru these instructional manuals of labyrinthine complexity and then assembling the ahem..."data".

[proud2BlibKansan]

1. Your link doesn't go to a specific video

[Smarmie Doofus]

2. Try it now; I think I fixed it. nt

[Hannah Bell]

3. I didn't realize that. Teachers of mentally retarded & autistic students have to put together

portfolios showing that those students "passed" 11th-grade lit to meet AYP & NCLB?

What a farce. What a waste of teachers' & students' time.

[Smarmie Doofus]

4. It is indescribably ridiculous.

And the size of the bureaucracy that produces the materials.... multiple, instructional manuals, AA reporting websites. Training films. ( Jobs for admins and consultants who get extra $$$ for "scoring" them. Why is there always a gravy train $$$ for someone attached to this.... again, NCLB generated.... crap?).

The testing and initial scoring of the students' work is done by the student's HR teacher. ( Where is the validity, the objectivity? There IS NONE. Therefore the whole assessment is worthless.) The consultants get that product and score it all again. Then it goes somewhere.... probably a warehouse in Albany... where no one ever sees it again.

As I said.... you have to see it to believe it.

[proud2BlibKansan]

8. I got to help score one year

It was just as you described. A week in a hotel for a dozen teachers while we spent our days reading assessments on computer screens. And three meals a day. Plus we were well paid.

It was interesting, to put it mildly.

The really sad thing is that after all this expense, I can't see a benefit to the kids. The benefit is to the school and the district, as alternative assessment kids almost always score well on their tests.

[Hannah Bell]

9. i don't think the general public is very aware of that. if they were, i think it would

increase their scepticism about nclb & ed deform generally.

why don't you do an op? in gd?

the money-making angle is good too.

[maryf]

5. The portfolios

Are basically meant to show these students' job readiness (at least in NYS), because, after all, isn't that what education is all about? Preparing the work force... :(

[proud2BlibKansan]

7. I'm in the middle of that process now

It's actually not a bad idea in principle. What screws it up is the pressure to put every child in sped on the alternative test. We (thankfully) have very strict guidelines in my state. But that doesn't prevent admins from wanting every kid to take it.

[proud2BlibKansan]

6. This is my world from November to March

Much of what he is saying is true. Alternative tests on general ed curriculum are particularly ridiculous for high schoolers. I completely agree.

However, he kept referring to kids with "single digit IQs". That was a complete turn off for me since there really ARE NOT any kids with single digit IQs in our public schools. I am far from an expert on IQ scores (I actually just know a little bit more about them than a general ed teacher) but I do know IQ scores of kids I have worked with and even Terri Schiavo had better than a single digit IQ. A person with a single digit IQ is truly a vegetable.

Maybe he was just using an expression but it was a huge turn off and, IMO, ruined his rant, which was reasonable other than that.

[Smarmie Doofus]

10. In the old days, there was a category of kids called "untestable".

That was for *IEP* purposes. But now , no one can be "untestable.," since "every child can learn" and of course "No Child can be Left Behind, yada yada, yada." So you're right: the youtube guy is engaging in hyperbole.

But he's essentially correct. It makes no sense... it would actually make fodder for an old Mel Brooks movie if weren't so sad and *true*..... to do AA on a severely autistic , profoundly intellectually disabled, 18 year old who will not answer the question "What is your name?" correctly but from whom you must get a work sample that demonstrates that he can produce a "timeline showing the last 5 presidents of the United states and the years they served."

I was given this example as an exemplary work sample on which to base my AA two years ago. Again, the AA bureaucracy considers what I just described to you as an "exemplary" AA product.

Nope. Not crazy at all.

The other thing..... some of my higher functioning kids could and should take standardized tests, but are regulated to AA. I'm doing one now. A CAT achievement test or an ITBS... both of which he's capable of completing ( he won't do well, that's why he's in special ed, but he could certainly sit for the test... would produce scores that have had least some scientific vlalidity and objectivity. The scores could then be compared to his previous scores. Valid conclusions could be made about his progress/non/progress based on the scores.

With AA, the tasks are pulled out of a catalogue.... more or less randomly. They vary from year to year. No valid comparisons can be made thru AA between what a kid did last year or the year before and what he's doing now. And remember.. this kid COULD sit for a legit scientific test.

ERGO: a complete..... waste..... of ....... everybody's.......... time.

Don't get me started about the money.

[proud2BlibKansan]

11. In the old days, we could exempt any kid on an IEP from testing

I always exempted every kid on my caseload. Testing is stressful and not the least bit beneficial for the student. My job is to advocate for their best interests. Testing wasn't in their best interests.

We also got to put them on Pass/Fail grades in the old days. Now we have to give them letter grades. I complain about that change more than the testing crap.