Movie about Student Loans

Here's a trailer for a upcoming documentary on student loans. The movie is called "Student Loans Default". It does make me wonder if we'll see a movement in education like we're currently seeing in healthcare.

Closing the standardized test results gap by changing the test

Is it just me or does this smell of the usual political manipulation of test results?

According to boston.com, Democratic National Committee chairman Tim Kaine today spoke about his work as the Governor of Virginia.

And, I am so proud of the work we are doing in Virginia to boost achievement in schools:

More than 87,000 ESOL students in the Commonwealth far outpace English language learners in other states around the country. Right now the National Assessment of Educational Progress – known as “the nation’s report card” – ranks Virginia number one in the nation for fourth-grade reading proficiency by English language learners.

Virginia’s ESOL program has also made significant strides to improve learning outcomes for English language learners – the Commonwealth now leads the nation in achievement. We took a stand against standardized tests designed for native English speakers, and created alternative tests for English language learners instead. Virginia closed the achievement gap between English language learners and other students from 21 points to 9 points, and improved the pass rate on Standards of Learning tests by non-native speakers by more than 20 percent (from 55 percent to 78 percent) since 2003. Virginia’s English language learners have also improved achievement overall on high school exit exams and national standardized tests.

Chewing Gum Can Improve Test Scores

According to Chris Chatham at ScienceBlogs, "there's ample evidence that chewing gum enhances cognition", although scientists aren't exactly sure why this is the case.

Whatever the case, I say bring some gum to your study sessions and exams!

Fitness level affects academic performance

According to the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, your fitness level is related to your academic performance. The following are findings from a study of grades K-8 in the 2007–08 school year:

- Standardized test score performance increases consistently with increasing fitness across all weight groups.

- Overall, students in the top 5% in fitness score 36 percentile points higher on standardized tests than students in the bottom 5% in fitness.

I guess that means that jocks aren't so dumb after all...

Only 20% of 16,000 sixth graders passed standardized exams in Math, Science and languages

In Gaza that is. Or at least that's what the Institute for Middle East Understanding says here.

Follow directions

The NYTimes.com's story, Just Following Orders: An Evil Essay tells the story of how on the SAT, Mr. Schrefer intentionally tried to submit the most evil essay possible crediting Nazis as the "brightest thinkers of our time". He did this while following the instructions which do not include anything about morality. He received scores from two graders, a 5 and a perfect 6, for his essay.

China's National Higher Education Entrance Examination

China's National Higher Education Entrance Examination (中华人民共和国普通高等学校招生全国统一考试) has been described as the "most pressure packed examination in the world". For Chinese students, who under the one child policy are their family's sole future earning potential, this is "a watershed that divides two dramatically different lives". If they score well, they can be accepted to higher education programs and go on to participate in the benefits of China's growth. If they they score poorly, there future is almost certainly to be working at the bottom of a very crowded peasant class. Here are some quick facts about the exam:
- Held annually over 3 days
- Prerequisite for almost all higher education institutions at the undergraduate level
- Usually taken in students' last year of secondary school
- Overall mark is generally a weighted sum of students' marks in different subjects
- Scored on a scale of 100-900 points
- Max score varies wildly from year to year
- Provinces allowed to customize their own examinations
- 3 mandatory subjects are Chinese, mathematics and a foreign language
- A mix of 3 sciences (physic, chemistry, biology) and 3 humanities (history, geography, political education) are taken depending on the programs being applied to
- In 2006, 8.8 million are estimated to have taken the exam
- In 2007, 7 students with overall highest score in their provinces entered Hong Kong's Universities rather than the two major Universities in China.

Using Social Media in University Admissions

A study by the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth entitled "Social Media and College Admissions: The First Longitudinal Study" highlights why it's important for students to keep their online image in proper order.

According to the report "a significant proportion of schools continue to research students via search engines (23%) and social networks (17%)." The report concludes that "the traditional factors will still play dominant roles in admissions decisions however no longer can students place damaging material online without potential consequences".

This is significant not only because it shows that universities are really doing their due diligence on their students, but indirectly points to potential way to reach out to admission officers, especially for more high profile applications like scholarships - through the links that come up when googling your name!

Standardized exams

Is it just me or have you noticed that standardized exams are like a political football?

In Ohio, a teaching union doesn't feel any love lost if they're less standardized exams in this world. In Romania, teachers banned a standardized test on the Romania language citing issues over recent hiring and firing policy changes by the Education Department. Something similar is happening in Los Angeles too! Might this be because standardized tests can be used to measure teaching performance as well as student performance?

In Arkansas, they're using different scoring strategies between state and national standardized exams. Their national scores keeping struggling while state exam results are skyrocketing. Guess which set of scores local educators point to?

John Taylor Gatto and his latest book "Weapons of Mass Instruction" is leading the charge by education professionals who feel the mere existence of standardized exams leads to teachers teaching to those exams and neglecting other forms of education thus limited our students to becoming standardized drones. And when you read stories like this one in Florida, you can understand his point.

The poor and underrepresented minorities feel that the rich will always score better on such exams thus perpetuating a cycle of poverty.

In Georgia, some people need to do some explaining about allegations on cheating on their standardized tests.

Standardized tests are frequently misrepresented. They can powerful indicators but can be manipulated in the spirit of "lies, damed lies and statistics". Look no further than the recent debate over Sotomayor and the exams used with firemen. On both sides of the issue people are passionate about what the results of the exams really mean and if the exam was even a valid measure.

Yet a serious alternative to standardized test hasn't emerged in the public debate. Whatever the case, standardized exams aren't going away. They're destined to exist as long as there's a need to judge the masses.

A great quote by Randall C. Deike, Vice president for enrollment at Case Western Reserve University who holds a Ph.D. in educational psychology.

"Too often standardized testing is condemned when it's really test misuse that's at issue."

Source: Take Tests Down a Notch, Report Says
Admissions group urges colleges to 'assume control' of debate on testing
Chronicle of Higher Education
By ERIC HOOVER

Insight into school principals and standardized tests

I came across this article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that sheds light into the competitive pressures on schools and their principals in performing well on standardized exams. Ever since No Child Left Behind was implemented, standardized exams have been a key metric in gauging school performances between 3rd and 11th grades. Some scores have risen drastically in a way that statistically points to cheating.

Insight into Reverse Discrimination through Standardized Tests in China

While reading about the ethnic tension that happened last week in Xinjiang China, I read an Associated Press article that stated the following.

A week before the Xinjiang riot, the hottest topic on the Internet — the most freewheeling public forum in China — was outrage over a top-scorer in the ultra-competitive college entrance exam.

The 17-year-old Han Chinese student's family falsely listed him as a minority, entitling him to 20 extra points and giving him a boost in landing places in top schools. The subterfuge, discovered by education officials, cut across notions of fairness in a society that for hundreds of years has seen standardized exams as a channel for merit-based advancement.

While riots and death are definitely horrible and newsworthy, the two paragraphs above caught my eye because, at Dr. Flowers Test Prep, we've reviewed research on how to address stereotype threat - the fear that one's behavior will confirm an existing stereotype of a group with which one identifies and which can affect performance - within standardized tests. In Malcolm Gladwell's book, Blink, The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, he describes how our unconscious views, may be quite different from our stated views and that these unconscious biases may have in educational performance. At Dr. Flowers Test Prep, we've identified a couple of test preparation techniques involving scaffolding/fading and priming as being strong ways of addressing stereotype threat and the self-fulfilling prophecies that can result from this phenomenon.

Where to find Happiness?

According to Happy Planet Index, Costa Rica tops the list of countries that are happy. Sadly the US is only 114th, but that's partly because the index weighs the ecological footprint of countries and the US is a massive polluter.

CNBC: Happiness Is ... Living Green in Costa Rica

CNN: Costa Rica tops list of 'happiest' nations

Google Wave Preview

An Introduction to Health Commons

This is a lovely video by John Wilbanks explaining the problem that Health Commons is attempting to solve through the connecting silos of knowledge using good design and good ol' trail and error.



Many of the points John so clearly describes are relevant to the work we're doing.

Part of his presentation discusses the need for trial and error in order to learn what works - a favorite topic at Logical Steps. Many of our projects over the years have required us to build things that we've never seen or heard of before. As humans our need for cognition leads us to seek to understand what we're building, how effective it will be and when it will be ready. Yet building something great comes from testing the boundaries and failing enough until you can formulate a strong enough hypothesis to build something that really works. This has caused us to reconsider what it means to deliver a product. We now view everything we work on in a state of evolution - a constant beta.

The video goes on to discuss connecting processes. As we've seen with Revenue Cycle University, connecting processes allow one to see the big picture and how an action in one step can affect something else that no one is yet aware of. Yet such insight comes at a cost as you need to identify, document and analyze processes before arriving at any conclusion. To get this part right requires interviews, observations, phone calls, emails, forum postings, organizing, reflection, fine-tuning, etc. We've worked out a way that allows us to teach others how to discuss their own processes and that was no small feat. So my hat's off to the folks at Health Commons for laying the groundwork for it to work the other way around.

NPR on the power industry

National Public Radio's program All Things Considered covered the power industry this week.

They detail that expertise is quickly leaving the power industry in the form of boomers retiring. We've heard this too while collaborating with Arizona State University in discussions with Arizona Power Supply. Separately I've also heard this point from major technology vendors in the utilities sector too.

This opens up great opportunities for younger people to backfill the positions. However, unless the skills are passed down quickly, the sector will likely face a skills shortfall. Complicating the matter is the introduction of newer technologies like green energy and intelligent power grids into the industry.

All of this foretells major efforts required to usher in the inevitable.

The Library of Kenya

I'm pretty psyched about the launch of the Library of Kenya. This is the brainchild of Ledama Olekina, a very busy guy. Besides running Maasai Education Discovery which has been bringing education to the rural communities in Kenya, running food drives and leading the charge to build Kenya's first national library system, he's running for president of Kenya.

With the help of the guys at OSSLabs, we setup a Koha library system and will iteratively customize it to support the needs of the Kenyan people. Exciting!

Revenue Cycle University

I've been extremely busy lately, Logical Steps has been rolling out Revenue Cycle University with "go live" dates this summer. This is part of Logical Steps' latest joint venture with the amazing folks at Zimmerman. In this venture, In this venture, we've rolled out 20+ courses to a major health system in New York and are in the process of rolling out 10 new courses to 6 clients. Each course must be customized for the client, for a total of 60 courses, not to mention demo courses!

As part of this initiative, we're also building a super cool learning system. I dare not say elearning system because that term has lost its meaning to me with all of the varieties, standards and actual ways that people learn online. That said, our system is leveraging the best from our work with new media platform R&D including social media, animations, closed-loop feedback, healthcare specific asset libraries and many more exciting features.

Considering that we have teams in US, Singapore and India working on this, we're managing 3 different holiday schedules. Each course has dozens of tasks and combined with the system development tasks, our current project plan has almost 1800 tasks. Whew!

TED Talks: be careful with plastic!

World ministers call for green economy

A meeting of environment ministers from around the world in Kenya has called for a 'global green new deal' that will see increased job creation and economic growth.

Click here for full story.