Contests the State of Texas argument in the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS) case that historical discrimination against African Americans and Mexican Americans is unrelated to their TAAS outcomes. Examines contemporary de facto school segregation, distribution of substandard teachers, and the relationship of these factors to student…

Disappointing high-stakes test results matter far less than the type of future citizens that schools produce. Citizenship values (teamwork, leadership, and neighborliness) are not assessed well by multiple-choice exams. Poor performers should not be segregated, data should be reinterpreted, and remediation should stress tutoring interventions, not…