SCHOOL `STANDARDS' ARE ALL THE RAGE NOW

The Outstanding Schools Act of 1993 mandated an expensive new scheme of testing for all Missouri schools. Henceforth, we won't have what previous, benighted generations knew as "tests" but rather something the educrats pretentiously call "performance-based assessments."

The subject-specific assessments, the absolute latest trend among the education faddists, are to be phased in by 2000. The first assessment, piloted in certain districts and approved for use in Missouri schools last week by the state school board, is in mathematics. Before receiving the state board's approval, the separate assessments for grades four, eight and 10 were administered to a carefully screened group of adult Missourians whose racial, sexual and other demographic composition is said to make it representative of the population at large.

The math assessment earned high marks from most of those at the sessions conducted last month by the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. We hope these folks are right, and that this isn't yet another bait-and-switch from the educrats at DESE. Recent experience hasn't been reassuring on this point.

"State education officials," said an Associated Press report this week, "have been warning for months that parents will be startled by the low grades on tests that were given a dry run last spring -- but also said the next round should improve, because teachers will focus more on material in the tests." Ah, yes: Teaching to the test. What, exactly is new about that?

As you hear state education officials lauding themselves for the high quality of these new assessments, remember that the cost will escalate dramatically. At a minimum we will move from the $8 to $10 per student for today's standardized tests all the way up to something like $45 per student, and possibly significantly more. Skeptics who have looked into the price in other states for the trendy assessments Missouri is moving to have learned that costs can reach $60 and even more. More than a few local school superintendents are rightfully concerned about seeing their budgets busted down the road.