Valentin Voroshilovn (2007), in his CTP-L (AAPT Committee on Teacher
Preparation) comment on my CTP-L post [similar to Hake (2007)] of 28
Apr 2007 titled "Forward From EdWeek: Chat With Nichols and Berliner
- 30 April 2007," wrote [bracketed by lines "VVVVV. . . ."; my insert
at ". . . . .[insert}. . . ."]:
VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV
A quick remark on "Campbell's law". . . .[ a social-science law that
states that "the more any quantitative social indicator is used for
social decision-making, the more subject it will be to corruption
pressures and the more apt it will be to distort and corrupt the
social processes it was intended to monitor."]. . . . .
This is a good illustration of the common mistake, namely,
interchanging the cause and the effect.
The usage of quantitative indicators just made the corruption
visible; blaming quantitative indicators for the distortion and
corruption is the same as blaming a microscope for the existence of
germs.
VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV
No, it's more akin to the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. Nichols &
Berliner (2005) in "The Inevitable Corruption of Indicators and
Educators Through High-Stakes Testing" wrote:
"George Madaus. . . . [in Madaus & Clark (2001)]. . . . has pointed
out that Campbell. . . .[(1976)]. . . has given the social sciences a
version of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. That principle,
concerned with measuring the position and velocity of objects,
informed physicists that if they measure one of these conditions they
could not accurately measure the other at the same time. Madaus'
version of the uncertainty principle with regard to Campbell's Law
states that if you use high-stakes tests to assess students,
teachers, or schools, the corruptions and distortions that inevitably
appear compromise the construct validity of the test. As the stakes
associated with a test go up, so does the uncertainty about the
meaning of a score on the test. That is, in high-stakes testing
environments, the greater the pressure to do well on the tests the
more likely is the meaning of the score obtained by students or
schools uninterpretable."
Richard Hake, Emeritus Professor of Physics, Indiana University
24245 Hatteras Street, Woodland Hills, CA 91367
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
<http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~hake>
<http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~sdi>
REFERENCES
Berliner, D.C. & S.L. Nichols. 2007. "High-Stakes Testing Is Putting
the Nation At Risk," Education Week 26(27): 36,48, 12 March, online
at <http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2007/03/12/27berliner.h26.html>.
Campbell, D.T. 1976. "Assessing the impact of planned social change,"
in G. Lyons, ed. "Social research and public policies: The
Dartmouth/OECD Conference," Chapter 1, pp. 3-45. Dartmouth College
Public Affairs Center, p. 35; online at
<http://www.wmich.edu/evalctr/pubs/ops/ops08.pdf> (196 kB).
Hake, R.R. 2007. "Re: NCLB: High-Stakes Testing Putting Nation At
Risk," Math-Teach post of Apr 28, 2007 5:38 PM; online at
<http://mathforum.org/kb/message.jspa?messageID=5674360&tstart=0>.
Madaus, G. & M. Clarke 2001. "The adverse impact of high-stakes
testing on minority students: Evidence from one hundred years of test
data," In G. Orfield & M. L. Kornhaber, eds., " Raising standards or
raising barriers? Inequality and high-stakes testing in public
education." The Century Foundation Press. Amazon.com information at
<http://tinyurl.com/2duzkp>. Note the "Look inside this book" feature.
Nichols, S.L & D.C. Berliner. 2005. "The Inevitable Corruption of
Indicators and Educators Through High-Stakes Testing," Arizona State
Univ., Education Policy Studies Laboratory, online at
<http://tinyurl.com/7butg> (1.7 MB). See also Berliner & Nichols
(2007) and Nichols & Berliner (2007).
Nichols S.L. & D. Berliner. 2007. "Collateral Damage: How High-Stakes
Testing Corrupts America's Schools." Harvard Education Press. See
<http://www.hepg.org/hep/Book/62>, which carries the praise of UCLA
emeritus professor W. James Popham: "This savage assault on
high-stakes testing in education arrives with a clear concern about
those most harmed by high-stakes tests-students and teachers. Nichols
and Berliner provide a carefully reasoned analysis laced with
frightening accounts drawn from public schools. Not merely another
pummeling of No Child Left Behind, this is a readable evisceration of
the premise that our schools can be evaluated with a single
indicator. If you care about public schooling, this is required
reading.
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