The Case for 'New Village' Schools

New small schools foster a different kind of accountability.

By Tony Wagner

Public education accountability is an abiding preoccupation of policymakers and business leaders today, and for good reason. We need to ensure that schools are truly educating all students for a future that is very different from the one their parents were prepared for. But growing numbers of people inside and outside of schools are concerned about the educational consequences of the increasing use of "high stakes" standardized tests as the primary driver of accountability.

Machine-scored tests do not measure the sophisticated skills of critical thinking, problem-solving, and so on that are essential for work and citizenship. The tests are also one-time events that do not give an accurate picture of an individual student's strengths and weaknesses, and the results usually cannot be used to diagnose students' educational needs. Nor do they provide educators with the knowledge needed to improve teaching. Finally, the greatly increased emphasis on high-stakes testing threatens to drive curiosity and love of learning as motivations for mastery out of the classroom. There's no time and too much fear for such "leisure" pursuits.

But what is the alternative? Thus far, many critics of standardized testing have been more concerned with seeking waivers than with describing an alternative system that would hold schools accountable for significant improvements...