Accelerated Reader not a publisher

[Paula Neale <PLNeale@AOL.COM>]

In a recent post comparing Scholastic Reading Counts to Accelerated Reader.
Steve Vander Ark noted that Scholastic is a publisher and that AR is not and
although he did not specifically say so, I got the impression that he meant
that as a point in AR's favor.  Well ..

AR may not be a publisher but neither are they some altruistic organization.
They are most certainly a company that is all about making profit and lots of
it.  Have you noticed some of the books that are now on their lists.  Whole
sets of those formula nonfiction series from Rourke and other places.  Does
anyone know just how it is decided what makes a book worthy of having a test
created for it and going on the AR list.  The catalogs certainly imply that
there is some kind of quality control, but I wonder.

I am not advocating for or against either of these programs, and I agree with
the point of Steve's post which was that any tools only works well if it is
used well.  But way way back when I went to library school we did a whole
unit on the JUNK that was published and sold to gullible school
administrators, teachers and librarians in order to grab some of the Chapter
2 federal funds.  It was stressed pretty strongly that one of the
responsibilities of librarians was to select using Selection tools not vendor
catalogs and to know the difference between an unbiased review and a company
promotion.

Now the big educational money seems to be in programs that purport to
increase student achievement.  If there is money to be made, there will
always be people trying to make it who may or may not have a good product.  I
think it's pretty scary how much money I've seen spent to buy what teachers
and administrators hope will be a foolproof, easy-to-use product based mainly
on the word of a friendly marketer or even a glitzy promotional flyer.
Just my two cents worth

Paula Neale, LMS
Ingels Elementary School
Kansas City, MO  64134
816-761-4343
plneale@aol.com

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