The Myth of Achievement Tests

The GED and the Role of Character in American Life

James J. Heckman, John Eric Humphries, Tim Kautz, James J. Heckman, John Eric Humphries, Tim Kautz

• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9780226100128
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

Achievement tests play an important role in modern societies. They are used to evaluate schools, to assign students to tracks within schools, and to identify weaknesses in student knowledge. The GED is an achievement test used to grant the status of high school graduate to anyone who passes it. GED recipients currently account for 12 percent of all high school credentials issued each year in the United States. But do achievement tests predict success in life? The Myth of Achievement Tests shows that achievement tests like the GED fail to measure important life skills. James J. Heckman, John Eric Humphries, Tim Kautz, and a group of scholars offer an in-depth exploration of how the GED came to be used throughout the United States and why our reliance on it is dangerous. Drawing on decades of research, the authors show that, while GED recipients score as well on achievement tests as high school graduates who do not enroll in college, high school graduates vastly outperform GED recipients in terms of their earnings, employment opportunities, educational attainment, and health. The authors show that the differences in success between GED recipients and high school graduates are driven by character skills. Achievement tests like the GED do not adequately capture character skills like conscientiousness, perseverance, sociability, and curiosity. These skills are important in predicting a variety of life outcomes. They can be measured, and they can be taught.
 
Using the GED as a case study, the authors explore what achievement tests miss and show the dangers of an educational system based on them. They call for a return to an emphasis on character in our schools, our systems of accountability, and our national dialogue. Contributors
Eric Grodsky, University of Wisconsin–Madison
Andrew Halpern-Manners, Indiana University Bloomington
Paul A. LaFontaine, Federal Communications Commission
Janice H. Laurence, Temple University
Lois M. Quinn, University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee
Pedro L. Rodríguez, Institute of Advanced Studies in Administration
John Robert Warren, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities

INDEX

2000 Status Report on the Pell Grant Program, 122

Accountability. See High school exit examinations (HSEEs)

Accountability movement, 10, 15–16, 19, 23, 36, 45, 59, 318, 319, 334

Achievement tests, 3–4, 5–6, 6n8, 10–19, 36–39, 109–110, 342, 345–346, 350, 352–357, 373, 377, 379, 380–381, 431, 434

—Armed Forces Qualification Test (AFQT), 142n8, 142n10, 143, 157, 160n40, 161, 164–165, 274, 274n3, 275, 282, 352–353, 380n79

—Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB), 144, 274, 283

—California Achievement Test (CAT), 377, 378, 385

—correlation between scores on, and grades, 346

—Differential Aptitude Tests (DAT), 352

—Iowa Tests of Basic Skills, 381

—Iowa Tests of Educational Development, 13, 20, 22, 58, 65–66, 70–72, 75

—National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), 13, 14, 14n45

—objectivity of, 15, 37n80

—origins of, 3, 10–19

—Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT), 142n8, 142n10, 143, 152, 153, 380n79

—performance of GED recipients on

—vs. other high school dropouts, 142–145

—vs. high school graduates, 142–145

—predictive power/predictive validity of, 3, 5, 8, 36–44

—Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT), 15, 15n46, 37n80, 42–44, 66, 95, 346n16

—validity of, 3, 15, 22, 23, 37, 38

—what they measure, 3, 4, 13, 37, 58–69, 69–72, 74–77, 80, 345–346, 346n12, 346n14, 346n16, 350, 352–353, 356, 357, 373n62, 377, 405, 410, 431, 43...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Copyright
• Title Page
• Epigraph
• Contents
• Comment from a GED Instructor
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• I. Introduction
• II. The History of the GED
• III. Evaluating the Benefits
• IV. The GED Creates Problems
• V. What Can Be Done to Promote Character?
• List of Contributors
• Notes
• Index