Matthew Lau: Ontario should ignore teachers' advice on standardized testing |
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Matthew Lau: Ontario should ignore teachers' advice on standardized testing
As per student spending has risen, test scores have fallen. Some teachers' unions don't seem to want parents to know that
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The Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation (OSSTF) declares it is “deeply concerned” that the provincial government’s review of its Education Quality and Accountability Office (EQAO) testing “does not include the expertise of teachers.” But the OSSTF has already made its position clear. In its submission to the Ontario government on 2025-26 education funding, it recommended abolishing EQAO. That’s also what it recommended the previous year, the year before that, and even the year before that.
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The OSSTF’s insistence that EQAO be abolished is understandable. According to the latest EQAO tests, only 58 per cent of Grade 9 students in the province’s English-language schools meet provincial standards in math, and the true percentage is probably even lower because only students who “fully participated” in the assessments are counted. If a quality and accountability office produced such devastating evidence of poor outcomes related to my job performance, I would want it abolished, too.
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That 42 per cent of Grade 9 students fail to meet standards is especially alarming given how low the standards are. For example, one test question asks about financing a $500 purchase with 10 per cent down plus monthly payments of $20.63 for two years (Option A) versus zero per cent down plus monthly payments of $15.56 for three years (Option B). The math is simple: Option A costs $50 plus $20.63 times 24, or $545.12, while Option B costs $15.56 times 36, or $560.16, so Option A is $15.04 cheaper. But even among “Level 3” students (equivalent to the letter grade B, which is counted as meeting provincial standards) only 68 per cent answered correctly. On the multiple-choice test, the other 32 per cent either said Option A is $5.07 cheaper, Option B is $5.07 cheaper, or Option B is $15.04 cheaper.
It bears repeating: with such dismal results, it is no wonder the OSSTF wants to abolish EQAO. What would it have the government do instead? Increase spending and reduce class sizes. In other words, hire more teachers, which — by coincidence, surely! — is also what would most increase the OSSTF’s budget and power by increasing the number of people forced to pay its dues.
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But there is no good reason to think increased government spending, whether on additional teachers or otherwise, would be effective in improving student outcomes. Case in point: under Ontario’s previous Liberal government, public school spending per student increased 39.4 per cent from 2003-04 to 2014-15, even after adjusting for inflation. But education only got worse.
The EQAO’s Grade 9 testing does not go back that far, but results from the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) do. It measures the performance of 15-year-olds across 70-80 countries depending on the year. As Ontario public school spending ballooned, Ontario students’ PISA math scores fell. In 2003, the average PISA math score in Ontario was 530. By 2015 it had fallen to 509. This is a massive decline: the OECD estimates 20 points is equivalent to approximately one year of learning.
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So: even as inflation-adjusted per-student public school spending increased 39.4 per cent, math scores fell so drastically that 15-year-old students in 2015 were effectively a year behind compared to their counterparts in 2003. And things have since gotten worse. The most recent PISA data are from 2022 since the tests are administered every three years and the 2025 results are not yet available. They show Ontario math scores falling further, to 495. Which suggests that as of 2022, Ontario’s Grade 10 math students were performing barely above what would have been eighth-grade level in 2003.
Ontario’s math education is clearly a shambles and experience has shown that throwing money at the problem, as the government might do if it followed the OSSTF’s advice, is not the answer. Nor is abolishing the tests that provide evidence of these dismal results.
It is a good thing several other methods have proven to work. Studies and literature reviews show school choice — which gives families alternatives to government-run schools staffed by unions who want to abolish standardized testing — improves academic outcomes. Unfortunately, Ontario currently gives families less choice than other provinces, a situation that needs to be corrected.
Other ideas for improvement are presented in a recent C.D. Howe study on improving math education. These include introducing foundational topics earlier, requiring automatic recall of basic math facts as an explicit learning outcome, improving math teachers’ knowledge of math, and — yes — strengthening provincial standardized testing. These are all good ideas. There is no need to consult the OSSTF to get bad ones.
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