A Teachable Moment

A parent who has become interested in our union’s efforts to reform the testing system in New York pointed me to Diane Ravitch’s blog with the email subject line of Brave New World. Expecting to read about the latest high stakes testing travesty, I was stunned to find Ravitch claiming that the Gates Foundation had supported research at Clemson University that seeks to measure student engagement and thereby teacher effectiveness by the galvanic skin responses of students who wear electronic bracelets during their classes. In short, the ultimate professional performance review, a molecular analysis of a professional’s teaching ability. The teacher too will wear a bracelet to measure how engaged she is in providing instruction. Ravitch call this “research” madness. I find a Yiddish expression coming to mind to describe both Gates and the “scholars” conducting these experiments. It translates as ugly souls.