What the Ky. Education Secretary doesn’t know

– Or, won’t admit

Governor Steve Beshear and his education team have been on a whirlwind tour of Kentucky to tout his new task force to “transform” education in the state. At Pikeville, The Appalachian News-Express reports (in an article whose headline misspells the governor’s name) that a question was asked about where the state stands on No Child Left Behind.

In answer, Kentucky Education Secretary Helen Mountjoy replied,

“We addressed the issue of other states lowering their standards to look better,” she said. “I think the position that Kentucky has taken is one that says we need to make sure our kids get the best education they can. If we lower our standards … we have a short-term bang for our buck and a long term sacrifice of the education of our kids.”

“My advice is, I don’t care what other states do — we have an obligation to our kids. For too many years we let them down, it not time to start again.” (All in bold is a direct quote from the news article)

Ms. Mountjoy is not correct. Kentucky most definitely has lowered standards on its tests. That is made very clear by new federal test results, which show the scoring of Kentucky’s fourth and eighth grade Kentucky Core Content Test in mathematics got easier – again – this year, as we already pointed out here.

Ms. Mountjoy does get one concept right – it is indeed our kids who are being let down by these scoring standards bait and switch games.