Accountability in the Public Schools?

by Patricia C. Behnke The new catch word in education has become accountability. Someone must be answerable for certain duties and accomplishments. But accounting for something also means to bring about death or destruction. Both seem to be happening in our public schools today. And most of the accountability has landed directly on the heads of teachers while the standards for accountability are being doled out by legislators who know nothing about public schools and even less about children. No one seems to be holding the politicians accountable for anything.

For the past seventeen years, I have taught high school English in Florida, but never have I seen the state play such a deadly game with its most precious commodity, its students. In Florida, we have Jeb Bush leading the drive to revamp education. One of his tools, the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT), was created to measure portions of the Sunshine State Standards. Written several years ago, these standards give teachers a benchmark by which to judge course and subject area content. This year, for the first time, students in the 10th grade must pass the FCAT in order to receive a regular diploma from the state of Florida. But those weren't the only students tested. Grades 3 and 4 and 5 and 6 and 7 and 8 and 9 took various portions of the FCAT in the areas of math and reading over a four day period this spring.

Recently the language arts supervisor from my district office told us that English teachers in the high schools are reading teachers of record, even though most of us hold literature degrees. However, we will be held personally accountable if a student fails to earn a diploma because of failing the FCAT. We will be held accountable for presenting the material, not actually teaching it. We must show in our lesson plans that we provided the opportunity for a student to learn the material. As long as we can do that, we were told, we would be safe from lawsuits directed at us personally. Is it any wonder that Florida and the nation is facing a severe teacher shortage in the coming decade? The FCAT is the new four letter "F" word to many teachers across the state. In the past two years, Florida has used the scores on this test to make schools accountable for teaching the standards. Each spring, schools receive a report card from the state's commissioner of education based on Bush's A+ Education Plan. The school's grade is determined by FCAT scores, the number of students who took the test, and the number of suspensions at a particular school.

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