Wasting time, writing standards.

By any reasonable measure, APS students are not up to "standards".

APS Winston Brooks' solution; "Let's go in search of other standards!" link

It is a variation of a recurring theme; juggle the standards every few years.

If you had a set of standards, like the ones we had when we were in school, and you used those standards over and over again, you would be able to spot trends; scores going down every year.

But if you re-norm the test every few years, then you always have too few years to point to a statistically significant trend.

Camouflaging the trends serves the interests of those who are responsible for the direction of the trend. If things are getting progressively worse, it pays to confuse the facts.

If students were doing better every year, you can bet that they wouldn't be looking for a "better" set of standards.

There are two pillars supporting performance;

1. standards, and
2. accountability to those standards

We have standards enough. We have too little accountability.

We have too little accountability at every level.

We will not find accountability in a search for other standards.

"Better standards" is a red herring; they would rather talk about standards than about accountability.

They have never met the standards; they have always fallen short.

You don't know that, because they re-norm the tests every few years.

It works well.