NCLB 2, Take 2
Meanwhile, the wail against testing has pervaded the land. Last night the President mentioned extending NCLB, and I swear I heard 3/4 of the nation boo. It's tempting to write this off as the ignorance of the general population in re quality measurement and the abysmal performance of our worst schools and classrooms - unacceptable performance which was obvious yet unproven until NCLB came along to shine the analytical light on it.

Yet, the people, as always, are pretty smart. Testing as its done now smacks of 1950's industrialization. There's nothing sophisticated or in-line about how we measure learning accomplishment. Are the replacement utilities here yet? No. For any number of organizational reasons, we're just behind at this. Yet the writing is on the wall. We'd better catch up; testing as it is is going to be tolerated only briefly. Going back to the 1990 status quo is unacceptable; so do lets all dig in and move forward.