by MariaofGA

Created on: July 05, 2009   Last Updated: July 07, 2009

Presently, we are in an era of accountability, high stakes standardized testing and standards-based reform. Some would argue that tests make us accountable, better educated, skilled and motivated. People want to know and have some assurance that a surgeon, teacher, or pilot has passed a legitimate skill and knowledge test. Other educators argue that the emphasis on standards and testing can have negative consequences. However, there is a relative absence of meaningful discussion of how to achieve equitable outcomes that do not unfairly penalize the most under-served students. High stakes testing creates a climate in which test scores may be raised by retention, push outs, and placement in special education instead of creating fundamental changes in the academic culture (Johnson, 2000). Although these reforms promote the notion that all students have the right to be educated to the same high standards, there are conflicting beliefs and values as to whether a social justice agenda of universal high achievement for all students is possible.

Accountability refers to the idea of holding schools, districts, educators, and students responsible for results. In more and more states and districts, policy makers are moving to reward achievement and punish failure in schools in an effort to ensure that children are getting a good education and that tax dollars aren't being wasted. The push for accountability has grown out of a common perception that states traditionally had monitored the ''inputs" in public education such as the number of books in the school library or the number of computers in the classroom, but had paid too little attention to performance. In the 1980s, the nation's governors proposed a kind of "horse trade". The state would provide more flexibility in how schools operated, as well as more money for the schools, if educators would agree to be held more accountable for student achievement (March, 2000).

The new accountability, enshrined in federal law since the mid-1990s and a major emphasis of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, focuses on student performance, schools as the unit of improvement, public reporting of achievement results, continuous improvement, and consequences for schools attached to performance (March, 2000). Under the No Child Left Behind Act, however, all states are required to rate all schools whether the schools have made "adequate yearly progress" toward meeting performance targets. States are not only seeking to hold

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