Comments on Superintendent Bergeson Says Her Failing Eyes Caused Her to Fail the WASL

I heard that on the news a couple days ago and wondered if it was covered on Slog or not. I seriously couldn't stop laughing for a good 15 minutes.

Well, funny, I don't recall the SECB reporting that the good Superintendent complained about not having her spectacles.....
What a joke!

So, does that mean the WASL is hard for people who need glasses?

...

Somebody better tell all the geeks.

I'm just curious: if a student failed the test because he or she couldn't read the questions, would they be allowed to retest? Or would they be failed?

OK, I get the first two no problem, but the third question I'm having a hard time understanding what the hell they are asking for. It's like a non-native english speaker wrote it.

@5 - the combined volumes of the two cubes is equal to the combined total of their edges - e.g. a 2m cube and 4m cube.

Problem two has no determinant solution because it's ambiguous about how the stacks are arranged. It says they touch, but in normal English the five stacks could touch and be of different heights. Maybe the mentally challenged EdD (a pleonasm) who wrote the question left his glasses at home too.

The first question is fine.

The other two are fucking pathetic.

At least add the word equal as in "equal" stacks.

The third question is written by someone who is not good at math. You need to understand more than your students and give them questions that make sense. Comparing lengths and volumes in some sort of integral unit-less world makes no sense, it's like a trivial pursuit question. Even though the students likely don't understand units and science you'll just help to destroy whatever intuition they do have.

And is there an algorithm to answer that last question? It's basically a stupid question about setting up a stupid problem [ 12(x+y) = x^3 + y^3 ]. Solving that sort of problem with the contraint that it's integer basically just means plugging and chugging: 1,2 1,3, 1,4, 2,3, 2,4...

I'm glad I don't have kids. This country is done.

The glasses thing is a few short iterations from the dog and homework thing.

There is no good reason to write question 3 as anything other than

x^3 + y^3 = 12(x+y)

Fucking recycling cubes? If you think about it for half a second, you would realize that no human being who has ever lived would take the time to find out, let alone give a shit, that the sum of the edge lengths of the two cubes is the same as the sum of their volumes. This is just an extra step to turn an algebra problem into a word problem and penalize ESL students. It has nothing to do with real-world problem solving skills.

So I see I'm not the only one who spent some time looking at #3. Does anyone have the answer? I remember how to complete a square but I never learned how to solve a cubic function. And I'm too old to start trying now.

@10: Get out a graphing calculator, plug in

Y = 1/12(x^3 + y^3 - 12x)

And pick up the roots from the graph.

Bergson's obviously lying. You can see from her notes that she perfectly understood the second problem and simply got it wrong. Her notes in the first question show that she could read at least some of it.

And if she couldn't read the questions, did she mantion that at the time?

Bergeson probably doesn't even know how to turn on a graphing calculator, let alone use it ...

Oops. Scratch #11; that obviously wouldn't work because most graphing calculators need an equation that is a function in terms of y.

So... solving for y in terms of x in that equation is highly non-trivial. All I can think of is to use the "cubic equation". Then you graph that and look for where the graph passes through the intersections on your graph paper. Those intersections are where x and y are both integers.

The appropropriate solution is to just guess and check. If you start at 1,2 and work your way up you'll get to the answer (2,4) fairly quickly.

A turd of a question. Who writes this shit?

@9,

It punishes native speakers as well. Notice how many people here and in the other thread couldn't understand the problem at all or misinterpreted it. I also want to see some good explanations as to why kids need to understand complex algebra just to graduate from high school.

Seeking sense in the questions on the WASL is like seeking sense in the rationale for invading Iraq. There's no 'there' there.

The WASL and the entirety of the No Child Left Behind program isn't about making sure kids get what they need to survive in the world. NCLB is about destroying the public schools so private industry can take over the education of the children of the US. It's about making the population of the US dumber, so that over time we become easier to control and manipulate. Educated people don't want to work for shitty employers. Educated people won't buy stuff when you tell them to. Educated people complain when they experience something unfair or unjust. Worst of all, when educated people get really mad they organize themselves and demand redress of their grievences. That kind of behavior cannot be allowed to continue or the very wealthy in this nation will be in jeopardy of losing their wealth and power. And then where will we all be?

Keshmeshi @ 9: There is no complex algebra here. To do #3, no one should actually be applying the general solution to the cubic a^3 + b^3 = 12(a+b). They tell you they are looking for an integer solution. You try (a,b) = (1,2), (2,3), (1,4), (2,4) and you have your answer on the fourth try. This is just about being able to write an equation from a story problem and know what that equation means.

(It is nonetheless a poorly written problem because real lengths have units, and the units on the two sides of the equation don't match. Another way of saying this is that the statement of the problem is unit dependent -- it "works" for cubes with sides 1 ft and 2 ft, but not 12 in and 24 in. That said, engineers and math teachers use "unit-dependent" equations all the time, and after four years of working with them a student should be able to see the problem-writers intention.)

TacomaRoma @ 17: Yeah, whatever. I'll listen to you when you show me you can do those math problems.

I agree that the writing on the question sucks, and it is not a trivial equation to solve without a calculator. If anyone else is dissatisfied with the plug in and guess method, here's a *little* better way (though it still involves some guessing). Rearrange the equation such that

g=-(L2^2-12)/(L1^2-12)

where g=L1/L2>1

To make g positive, you know that L2=4. Then start checking integer values, starting with (4,3) - that gives g

yikes, I lost some formatting there. That's L2 is greater than or equal to 4 and L1 is less than or equal to three.

Start with (4,3) giving g less than one.

Move to (4,2) which gives the right ratio.

Those greater/less signs came out as tags - sorry.

aaand I swapped L1 and L2 in my correction. What an idiot.

Solution L1=4, L2=2.

yeah would the stranger please make a big deal out of this. its apparent from her own notes that she wrote under the questions that she was able to read the information in the question. WASL needs to be removed, standardized tests only test how well someone can do on a standardized test, thats it.

Call 10 people and ask them to call 10 people and so on with the following message:

Don't vote for Terry Bergeson. She is destroying our education system in Washington State.

Call 10 people and ask them to call 10 people and so on with the following message:

Don't vote for Terry Bergeson. She is destroying our education system in Washington State.