Unhinged: Reading Comprehension Tests as Gatekeepers to Teaching

Abstract

A teacher’s ability to read effectively is critical to that individual’s ability to teach reading skills. Correspondingly, most state departments of education require that prospective teachers earn a passing score on a standardized reading comprehension test before they can enter university-based teacher education programs or otherwise get a professional teaching license. Having witnessed quality candidates get pushed away from teaching due to poor performance on the our state’s reading comprehension measure and given that previous studies have shed doubt on the construct validity of major standardized assessments (e.g., the SAT and ACT), we examined the validity of our state’s standardized reading assessment for teachers. Using data generated by 115 college-aged participants in a prerequisite course for our teacher education programs, we found that our state’s assessment did little to measure reading comprehension. Instead, it measured students’ test-taking skills. This is exceptionally problematic because tests like this one keep significant numbers of qualified and motivated individuals from entering the teaching profession. Worse, due to the oft-researched relationship between test-taking skills to the socioeconomic background of the test-taker, these impacts may be exponentially worse for individuals from minority and lower socioeconomic backgrounds, thereby further reducing their opportunities to teach.