CATS Task Force Ends 2008 With Little Accomplished

The Kentucky Department of Education’s “Assessment and Accountability Task Force” (often called the CATS Task Force) appears to have ended its 2008 session with little accomplished.

On the most heavily discussed item – writing portfolios – the group remained hopelessly deadlocked following discussions rich in agendas and assertions – but short on examination of real data.

Five meetings after task force member Steve Stevens requested discussions on how Kentucky performed on the National Assessment of Educational Progress’ eighth grade writing exams, that revealing information still has not been discussed (Thanks to two Bluegrass Institute YouTube programs comparing writing performance in Kentucky to California and Tennessee, this blog’s readers can learn more in less than five minutes about how Kentucky really stacks up in writing instruction than most task force members know).

In addition, a promised discussion of the 2007-08 writing portfolio audit was never presented. Of course, the discussion of the 2006-07 portfolio audit at meeting 3 provided compelling evidence that portfolio scoring is hopelessly inflated (after the meeting Kentucky Department of Education personnel indicated to me that the new audit continues to show the same thing).

Thus, perhaps the most unreliable element in the entire CATS program festers on without any recommendation from the task force.

Sadly, thanks to the time expended on the portfolio back and forth, many other important agenda items never got any real consideration. Find those overlooked items listed along with a general discussion of other matters from meeting 7 in the Bluegrass Institute’s new policy Wiki.

The Wiki also lists the task force’s four recommendations. Considering the limited amount of discussion most of those items received, and considering the very large number of unanswered technical questions on each recommendation (things like how much they will cost, for example), I won’t use space here talking about them – except to say that I don’t see how the Kentucky Board of Education or the legislature will get much of use from them.

In fact, one of the best judgments on this task force has been the absence of reporters at any of the meetings. Clearly, the major media in this state were not impressed by this effort.

Something that needs discussion is the fundamental problem with this task force. Because the legislature used this task force as an excuse not to conduct its own hearings on CATS during the legislative interim, the task force needed to be unbiased. It should never have been convened under the control of the Kentucky Department of Education.

The department of education has a lot of earnest people, but it also has too many pride of authorship issues to conduct a fully objective and open discussion of CATS. The problem was clear from the outset, when Commissioner Jon Draud stated that he didn’t want the task force to recommend any major changes to CATS. That position cast a shadow over what followed.

Certainly, the department’s position that major changes should wait until after 2104 was hotly disputed by some task force members like Senator Dan Kelly (good job, Dan) and a number of very honest educators on the committee, too. However, the overall makeup of this group virtually guaranteed it would be unable to reach consensus on important issues.

So, here are some suggestions to move us forward.

The Kentucky Supreme Court ruled that the legislature, not the Kentucky Department of Education, is ultimately responsible for education in the commonwealth. Our legislators need to acknowledge that and take over management of the task force, reconstituting it to get results, not inaction.

It’s also time to stop ignoring uncomfortable data about CATS. The results of writing portfolio audits have always told us the same thing – portfolio scoring is inherently unreliable and inflated. Failure to look at the strong evidence about Kentucky’s writing performance from the National Assessment of Educational Progress is simply inexcusable and was an unacceptable snub of Steve Stevens, as well.

It’s time to listen to our teachers, who courageously and emphatically stated in task force meetings that having writing portfolios in the assessment program actually interferes with their ability to teach writing. The national assessment data shows that – but this CATS Task Force doesn’t know that.

Anyway, with another year passed, CATS remains no better than it was – unless the legislature moves on its own without paying much, if any attention, to the task force. Of course, in the end, there really isn’t much from this task force to pay attention to, anyway.