But, We Still Need Licensure Tests

Licensure tests:
depending on who you ask, they’re either an important check on a prospective
teacher’s knowledge before entering the profession or a burdensome requirement
that keeps good candidates out of the classroom. A new
study from CALDER researchers Dan Goldhaber, Trevor
Gratz, and Roddy Theobald takes a look at the validity of a battery of tests
taken by aspiring Washington state teachers.

The researchers studied
the relationship between two kinds of licensing tests used in the state and
student performance. Specifically, they examined the basic skills test that
almost every Washington teacher must take in order to gain admission to a
teacher preparation program and subject matter tests, limited in this study to
teachers taking secondary math and biology tests.

The findings were
mixed. The state’s basic skills test served as a “modest” predictor of student
outcomes in math and ninth-grade biology. So, too, was the biology test quite
predictive. However, the math test was not particularly effective in predicting
student performance.

What
could explain a result that says subject matter knowledge in biology does
matter but math does not?

Author
Dan Goldhaber offers this insight: “The short
answer is that we really don’t fully understand these different results because
there is so little evidence to date about what predicts the effectiveness of
science teachers. A bit of speculation, however. It is important to remember
here that we did find a relationship
in math, just not as strong a one as might have been expected. After all,
teachers who did better on the basic skills test—which includes math—were more
effective. It would not surprise me if the math subject tests would have turned
out to be more predictive for later high school math courses, such as calculus,
where a teacher’s specific content knowledge of calculus is without question
important.”

To that point, we were
surprised to read that this study was enough for at least one education
advocacy group, MarylandCAN,
to issue a call for the end to meaningless licensing tests—in our view, a
hair’s breadth away from asserting that teacher’s subject matter knowledge
doesn’t really matter. A slippery slope, indeed.