(np) merit pay

[David Payne]

I moved a lot when I was a kid. Some of the schools that I went to were great, and some of them sucked. 

I went to one elementary school where you had to buy your own textbooks. If you couldn't afford the books--tough luck. You either borrowed them from a friend or failed.

It's not like that there anymore. There was a lawsuit in that state on the basis that equitable funding mattered. The lawsuit ironed out some of the funding. Along with the funding came statewide educational reforms: http://www.schoolfunding.info/states/ky/lit_ky.php3

I believe that these reforms were instrumental in shaping the Clinton educational reforms, which were, in turn, instrumental in shaping the Bush education reforms, which were instrumental in shaping the Obama educational reform model.

I don't know; maybe I'm wrong--but my point is that the historical root of these statewide tests is a desire to remove some utterly unfair and fundamental inequities that are pressed upon children.

I'm not saying that they are fulling this goal--but I am saying that we couldn't just leave well-enough alone, because well-enough didn't exist.

I'm just speaking up in hopes of nuancing the idea that testing is bad and anti-teacher, because I don't think that it is that simple.
 		 	   		  
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