I am here to type these words.

I was asked today why I had not posted anything lately.  Gone is my excuse of doing those 50 post in 50 days…that ended near a month ago.  It was a priority and a sense of duty to take care of it.  You know, to deliver the goods…or at least deliver well, something.

Test season is here in the State of Indiana.  I am not sure why we Hoosiers think we are so important that we need to make things so difficult for students.  Things don’t have to be this complicated.  Look at some other states and how they go about things and you’ll find that, in some cases, Indiana spends too much time with the T-square and the compass and the protractor trying to chart the course.  Test them all, they say!  They do.

I was not a good test taker in high school.  I can empathize with kids about this.  The older I got, the better I got at it.  When I took something called the GRE to get into my grad school program, I was certain they gave me someone else’s results.  I took them home and smiled.  That only lasts so long.  There is still work to do.

The latest graduation proposal beginning with the Class of 2023 in Indiana high schools is not a very good one.  Too many moving pieces and parts.  The verbiage is weak in places and seeps of elections to come may very well change a thing or two here.  I hope so.  We can do better.

“What is a test score without civility?”  I said that at meeting recently with other education folks from the county in the room.  We were there putting our heads together for the good of the cause.  It was meaningful dialogue.  That is not always the case when there is a power-point, snacks on the table, and multiple building levels in the same room trying to make sense and make nice.  It worked.  I was proud of that.

Test scores.  I’d rather have someone in the room I can depend on than a test score that looks nice.  Now….don’t get me wrong.  Test scores are important.  They can measure what needs a yardstick now and again.  But the notion of a one size fits all measuring instrument is, well, archaic.

The need to make that point is why I type these words today.  I think I could be a little more effective for my school talking to kids more and chasing down test logistics less.

Speaking the rights…

Danny Johnson