Trend+4

===**Trend 4: Standards and high-stakes tests will fuel a demand for personalization in an education system increasingly ‍committed to lifelong human development. (Standardization -+ Personalization) **===

__**External Trends **__

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 1. The U.S. is the only economically advanced nation to rely heavily on multiple-choice tests. Other nations use performance-based assessment where students are evaluated on the basis of real work such as essays, projects and activities. Ironically, because these nations do not focus on teaching to multiple-choice tests, they even score higher than U.S. students on those kinds of tests. ======

2. Standardized tests don’t always provide accurate accountability. Tests that measure as little and as poorly as multiple-choice tests cannot provide genuine accountability. Pressure to teach to the test distorts and narrows education. Instead of being accountable to parents, community, teachers and students, schools become "accountable" to a completely unregulated testing industry.

3. Schools often use standardized tests to determine if children are ready for school, track them into instructional groups; diagnose for learning disability, retardation and other handicaps; and decide whether to promote, retain in grade, or graduate many students. Many "labels" are given to students based on these tests.

 4. Community partnerships between schools and parents should replace the current top-down model of accountability, and the state should support those efforts. Students are unique, and they will not be standardized. Schools must be dedicated to democratic principles that promote self-determination and freedom, rather than the control and manipulation provided by standardization.

5. Providing a balance between the standardization of education and personalization of independent growth should foster more well-rounded students with better capabilities to function and contribute within society.

1. In order to have a viable well designed personalization program, strong communication must exist between the teachers, central administration, and the Department of Education. Both central administration and the Department of Education must not only articulate their requirements but they must allow each individual school the latitude and opportunity to design a personalization program that reflects the school population.
 * __Internal Trends __**

2. Many teachers will adapt to “teaching the test,” which means focusing on the content that will be on the test, sometimes even drilling on test items, and using the format of the test as a basis for teaching. Since this kind of teaching to the test leads primarily to improved test-taking skills, increases in test scores do not necessarily mean improvement in real academic performance. Teaching to the test also narrows the curriculum, forcing teachers and students to concentrate on memorization of isolated facts, instead of developing fundamental and higher order abilities.

3. Students from low-income and minority-group backgrounds are more likely to be retained in grade, placed in a lower track, or put in special or remedial education programs when it is not necessary. They are more likely to be given a watered-down or "dummied-down" curriculum, based heavily on rote drill and test practice.

4. In many districts, raising test scores has become the single most important indicator of school improvement. As a result, teachers and administrators feel enormous pressure to ensure that test scores go up. Schools narrow and change the curriculum to match the test. Teachers teach only what is covered on the test. Methods of teaching conform to the multiple-choice format of the tests. Teaching more and more resembles testing.

5. Teachers should support their students to achieve by connecting learning to students' interests and experience and involving students in the planning and success of their educational experience. Schools should identify and implement desired personalization efforts that they feel will best serve their students' particular needs. Strategies may include teacher teaming, developing specific committees to target particular areas of student interests, or implementing personal learning plans for individual students.