Mike Petrilli doesn't just review a policy request; he exposes the dangerous gap between educational ambition and technical reality in Indiana's latest accountability overhaul. While the state seeks federal permission to rewrite the rules of school evaluation, Petrilli argues that the proposed metrics are so ill-defined they risk rewarding schools for gaming the system rather than improving it. This is not a dry bureaucratic dispute; it is a high-stakes test of whether the federal government will enforce standards or capitulate to political convenience.
The Trap of Inflated Metrics
The core of Petrilli's argument rests on a warning that sounds like a law of physics: "Goodhart's Law will prove to be just as inevitable as Newton's Laws." He posits that when a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure. Indiana's proposal relies heavily on "easily inflated student GPA, ill-defined 'soft' skills accumulation, and accumulation of credentials that are often industry-recognized only on paper." Petrilli contends that holding schools accountable for metrics they can directly manipulate is a recipe for disaster.
He highlights the specific technical failure in Indiana's plan to measure "communication and collaboration." While the state's messaging is full of grand aspirations, Petrilli notes that "in all their materials, they only have a single slide with any information about how they will do this, and of the three sentences on that very spare slide, two are questions." This is a critical vulnerability. The state is asking for flexibility to measure skills that the field has not yet solved, let alone standardized. As Petrilli puts it, "There's a big difference between 'might soon exist' and 'are currently ready for prime time.'" A counterargument might suggest that waiting for perfect data stifles innovation, but Petrilli's point is that without validation, the data is merely noise that obscures student needs.
Accountability based on inflatable credentials is worse than no accountability at all.
The Menu Problem and the Texas Comparison
Petrilli draws a sharp distinction between Indiana's approach and the more rigorous, albeit imperfect, model in Texas. He points out that Indiana's "choose your own adventure" menu allows schools to pick the easiest path to a credential, whereas Texas ties its metrics to outcomes with direct relevance to higher education and the workforce. He writes, "To use the words from Indiana's waiver, 'unique experiences like work-based learning... matter to a student's future success,' but not all unique experiences are equal in terms of how much they ultimately benefit students."
The author argues that the federal government must insist on guardrails. Specifically, he urges the Department of Education to require that scores for each indicator include the performance of all students, rather than allowing states to cherry-pick subgroups. He warns that without this, "advocates and community members can see where schools may be leveraging the new system to hold some students to lower expectations." This echoes the historical lessons of Goodhart's Law, where the pressure to meet targets leads to the degradation of the very quality those targets were meant to measure. If the executive branch approves a system where schools can opt out of testing certain groups or inflate soft-skill scores, they set a precedent that could unravel accountability nationwide.
The Case for Innovation vs. The Reality of Failure
Despite the heavy criticism, Petrilli acknowledges a compelling counter-narrative from Brenda Dickhoner, who argues that the current federal framework has failed to produce results. She notes that across billions of dollars in federal school improvement grants, "no significant impact was found on student math or reading scores, high school graduation rates, or college enrollment." Petrilli admits this is a strong point: "Maybe we should try something different?" He agrees that the "disappointing results of the past ten years under ESSA" warrant a new approach.
However, he cautions against throwing the baby out with the bathwater. While Dickhoner champions the idea of "removing rigid eligibility requirements" to let supports follow the student, Petrilli insists that innovation cannot come at the cost of transparency. He suggests that the administration might be wise to "encourage some other states—those whose accountability systems have been around a while—to go first" before approving Indiana's untested model. The tension here is palpable: the desire to escape the stagnation of the Every Student Succeeds Act versus the risk of adopting a system that lacks the technical capacity to measure success accurately.
The Broader Context of Reform
The piece also serves as a rebuttal to the growing pessimism among progressives who claim that schools cannot close achievement gaps. Petrilli highlights voices like Jonathan Chait and Vlad Kogan, who push back against the idea that "nothing works." Kogan's argument is particularly stark: "Genetics are not academic destiny. Upward mobility is possible." Petrilli uses this to frame the Indiana debate not as a rejection of reform, but as a plea for reform that actually works. He notes that the field is seeing a shift where "elite opinion writers are awakening to America's educational malaise and urging policymakers to do something about it."
Yet, the path forward remains fraught. If the administration approves Indiana's waiver without demanding rigorous validation of their new metrics, they risk validating a system where "moral hazard" is built into the design. Petrilli's final warning is clear: "If there is not enough political will to enforce standards that cannot be gamed, then we shouldn't bother to rely on centralized accountability systems at all." The choice is binary: enforce high, ungameable standards, or abandon the centralized system entirely. Anything in between sets a dangerous precedent.
Bottom Line
Petrilli's strongest move is identifying the technical void in Indiana's plan, proving that ambition without validation is merely a loophole waiting to be exploited. The argument's biggest vulnerability lies in the political reality that the administration may prioritize flexibility over rigor to satisfy state demands. Readers should watch to see if the federal government holds the line on data transparency or if it allows the "menu" approach to become the new national standard.
If we don't, Goodhart's Law will prove to be just as inevitable as Newton's Laws.