Here Plummer confuses correlation with causation. Ice cream is the a textbook example of this faulty logic: Research has found, for example, that there is a positive correlation between the consumption of ice cream and murder, drowning, boating accidents, and shark attacks. It’s not that the ice cream kills. It’s the fact that people tend to swim and boat in summer, and hot weather also seems to exacerbate violence that leads to death.
Ice Cream Kills, MCAS Makes You Smarter & Other Thoughts
So is this a suprise?
First-year students at Massachusetts public colleges who scored well on the high school math and English MCAS exams earn higher grades and more course credits than students with lower scores, and they are more likely to stay in school, a new study by the Massachusetts Board of Higher Education has found.
That kids who do well on MCAS do better in college. Kids with higher IQ’s tend to do better on MCAS and in college too. Kids from upper-middle class families or with educated parents tend to do better too. Kids who do well on their SAT’s do well their first semester of college, but the SAT’s don’t make them do better in college. Of course, SAT’s aren’t behind a major educational policy.
With a Ph.D. in education from Boston College, Plummer should know the difference between causation and correlation. She’s misleading the public either on purpose (shame on her) or ignorance (shame on former Gov. Romney). The “preliminary” report that prompted the article doesn’t seem to be available, which certainly cuts down on direct criticism of the findings. Schworm, to his credit, does his best to provide us with conflicting opinions.
Some said the findings were predictable and showed only that brighter, harder-working students were more likely to succeed at college, not that the tests were improving education.
“I don’t think anyone is surprised that students who do better on the MCAS exam do better in college,” said Representative Carl M. Sciortino Jr. , a Medford Democrat who has filed legislation to stop denying students diplomas based solely on MCAS scores. “That means nothing in terms of producing better-prepared graduates overall.”
–Mark
Please share widely!
It’s hard to say much about the $2 million study from this article, certainly not from Patricia Plummer’s comments.
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The only conclusion I see Plummer make is one that contradicts the study results. The study says those that score well on the MCAS do well as freshmen in college. But Plummer emphasizes that after you pass the MCAS, it is important for students to continue taking english and math classes or they will have to do that work in college, without credit.
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UMASS itself does not consider the MCAS in the admissions process. They recommend, but do not require, either the SAT or the ACT. There are a couple of Dept of Education scholarship programs based on MCAS scores, but other than that, the MCAS doesn’t get you very far in any four-year college admissions.
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The conclusion that is reached about MCAS and UMASS students only applies to freshmen. The study begins with those who graduated high school in 2005. Other broader studies that track SAT scores I’ve heard discussed indicate SAT doesn’t predict much beyond the freshman year. Pretty good chance the SAT studies would be deeper and more accurate than the $2 million being put into tracking MCAS through Massachusetts public colleges.
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Wonder where that grant money came from.
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Only about 40% of high school graduates go on to college. Why the heck should a test that’s intended to address the median of high school graduates be stretched into a one-size-fits-all tracking device? I think the whole standards movement is falling into the same logical conundrum as Patricia Plummer. The only tool they have is the MCAS, so they’re off scouting the world for ways to apply it.
MCAS is the logical end of the standards movement. I’ve been studying the history of the high school for my comps and as far back as the 1950’s, people like Arthur Bestor were arguing for standards and testing to enforce them. MCAS is purely a tool of enforcement. It doesn’t yield valuable data and gives us little in the way of suggestions for improvement.
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The funny thing about this study is that its existence is meant to give the test some validity, which is kind of bassackwards. If we’re going to test, I’d prefer to start with a valid test.
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YOu’re right on with the SAT’s. They are valid predictors of grades in the first semester of college. That’s about it. Extremely low and high scores probably correlate with IQ, but of the vast majority in the middle they tell us nothing.
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Plummer is a former nutrition professor who spent most of her life in educational administration. I couldn’t find any record of her publishing anything.
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Mark
MCAS is the logical end of the standards movement. I’ve been studying the history of the high school for my comps and as far back as the 1950’s, people like Arthur Bestor were arguing for standards and testing to enforce them. MCAS is purely a tool of enforcement. It doesn’t yield valuable data and gives us little in the way of suggestions for improvement.
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The funny thing about this study is that its existence is meant to give the test some validity, which is kind of bassackwards. If we’re going to test, I’d prefer to start with a valid test.
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YOu’re right on with the SAT’s. They are valid predictors of grades in the first semester of college. That’s about it. Extremely low and high scores probably correlate with IQ, but of the vast majority in the middle they tell us nothing.
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Plummer is a former nutrition professor who spent most of her life in educational administration. I couldn’t find any record of her publishing anything.
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Mark
Just for the record. The study didn’t cost 2 million dollars, the National Governor’s Assn grant (funded by Bill and Melinda) was two million over two years, one of the the initiatives of the grant was to hook up the public higher education data system with k-12 system. This info came out of that integration of the systems, and is not the entire “study”
I deduced that was probably the grant involved, but you certainly couldn’t tell from the article.
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Googling through board of higher ed minutes, it appears to me (understatement) that the board of higher ed is more interested in what kids do after taking the MCAS than what they score on the MCAS. Higher ed wants a rigorous college prep curriculum for the kids who will attend college.
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Reading the news article again, the fact that the average college grades for those with “needs improvement” is only half a grade point below those who scored “advanced” on MCAS suggests some recallibration of metrics somewhere might be in order. I would have expected kids scoring advanced on MCAS to score higher than a B as college freshmen, and kids with a minimum pass on MCAS to score lower than a C+. I guess you’d need more information on the two populations to do more than speculate, but if this is the high point of the study – the one thing the state chooses to send to the press boosting the MCAS as a pathway to higher ed – I’d watch for rats jumping off this ship.
except to curriculum standards (and some standards are never really tested). It is supposed to measure how well students students have learned curriculum standards.
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A test that would predict grades in college would require true alignment between high schools and colleges. Our curriculum standards were never designed to be that specific.
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Mark
Back in 2000, when I took the MCAS (the last year it didn’t count), I was one of 15 people in my (very bright) class who scored an Advanced on both the Math and English sections. I also did well in my freshman year of college, a very lazy 3.5 GPA. Let’s just say that things declined from there. LOL.
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There are two types of intelligent people: people who get bored with mostly easy work and people who don’t. By my senior year, blogging became far more interesting than most of my classes and I used my laptop, errr… rather well “taking notes.” =p Now, my GPA isn’t anything special, though my GPA in my major is still pretty good.
Am I the only one who finds it a gross violation of my privacy that the state would essentially share my personal information with the folks at my high school?