Education Week - May 14, 2014 - 32

LETTERS to
the EDITOR
Tests Should Assist, Not Determine,
Teacher-Certification Decisions
To the Editor:
How should the edtpa or Praxis Performance
Assessment for Teachers be used? JoAnn
Bartoletti, Gail Connelly, Daniel A. Domenech,
and Sharon P. Robinson posit in their recent
Commentary that performance tests for
new teachers make sense ("Why We Back
Performance Tests for Would-Be Teachers," April
16, 2014). Yet there seems to be an avoidance of
the fact that the state of New York considers the
edtpa to be a high-stakes, pass-fail assessment
affecting teacher certification. Even recent
action by the state board of regents to provide
a temporary alternative to teacher education
candidates who fail the edtpa does not change
this fact.
The authors should recognize that many
teacher-preparation institutions employ a
rigorous process of observation and accredited
assessment measures to gauge teacher
effectiveness. Future teachers receive weekly
observations and multiple formative evaluations
throughout the student-teaching period and
must pass other appropriate benchmark
assessments.
On the other hand, the edtpa is based on
three to five learning segments (lessons) that
are assessed by a scorer's use of 15 subjective
rubrics.
Does this implementation process of the edtpa
make sense? The edtpa may be a valuable tool
for ensuring that competent candidates become
certified; however, it would be more appropriate
if it were used as just one instrument to assist
in the development of a future teacher.
Edward J. Sullivan
Associate Dean for Teacher Education
Marist College
Poughkeepsie, N. Y.
Essay's 'App Generation' Description
Misrepresents Book, Authors Say
To the Editor:
As the authors of The App Generation, we
were disappointed to read Jody Passanisi's
mischaracterization of our book in her online
First Person essay on a separate book, Danah
Boyd's It's Complicated: The Social Lives of
Networked Teens ("What Teachers Need to
Know About 'Networked' Teens," Education
Week Teacher, www.edweek.org, April 1,
2014).
At the end of her review, Ms. Passanisi
compares our book to Ms. Boyd's and asserts
that we "have blamed technology for all that is
(perceived to be) wrong with kids these days."
This is a blatant misrepresentation of
our work and suggests that Ms. Passanisi
has not, in fact, read our book. If she had,
she would have seen that we are careful to
present both the pros and cons associated
with young people's technology use in
three key areas of life experience: identity,
intimacy, and imagination. Moreover, a
central contrast we present in the book
illustrates our argument that it is not
technology that shapes young people, but
how they use it.
If young people use technology as a
jumping-off point into new experiences and
modes of self-expression, we call that "appenabling."
However, if technology becomes
the sole means by which youths make their
life decisions, big or small, we call such
use "app-dependent." In fact, readers have
asked us for recommendations of apps that
are enabling, as well as for information on
which uses of an app push a user toward
dependence.
In short, we believe it is unfair to accuse
us of being either techno-determinists or
technophobes, as Ms. Passanisi has done in
her essay.
COMMENTARY POLICY
Education Week takes no editorial positions, but
publishes opinion essays and letters from outside
contributors in its Commentary section.
For information about submitting an essay or
letter for review, visit
www.edweek.org/go/guidelines.
Katie Davis
Assistant Professor
The Information School
University of Washington
Seattle, Wash.
Howard Gardner
Professor of Cognition and Education
Harvard Graduate School of Education
Cambridge, Mass.
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Education Week - May 14, 2014

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