Data Skewed to Promote National Student Database

An article from Inside Higher Ed provides a glimpse at the tactics being used by the Department of Education to push a national student database. According to the article, the Commission on the Future of Higher Education has been using data from the National Center on Public Policy and Higher Education for its upcoming report. The center has long been an advocate for increased tracking of student performance. Patrick M. Callan, president of the center, has been advising the Bush Administration on education policy.

The Secretary of Education’s Commission on the Future of Higher Education, which Callan has advised, has made a priority of pushing colleges to identify and to start using ways to measure learning. While there was much talk during the commission’s deliberations of having some test, the panel did not recommend that any single measure, but called on colleges to have easily understood, consumer-oriented tools that would allow prospective students and their families, as well as the government, figure out what happens during the years of an undergraduate education. Supporters of this push talked about the need for standards and accountability, while critics — especially amid discussion of possible national tests — cautioned against trying to measure all colleges in the same way.

If you read the whole article and explore the Center on Public Policy and Higher Education website, it because clear that one of their central arguments is that most testing should take place. The Department of Education seems to be basing their entire report on data from the center. If the data says that more testing is needed, then the necessity of a national student database is a forgone conclusion.

In my mind, this is strangely similar to the intelligence gathering that occurred before the invasion of Iraq. Bush administration officials cherry picked the information they wanted and ignored anything that countered their worldview. It appears that this approach to public policy is still alive and well at the Department of Education.