Best to Test

The scene is a sidewalk winding through a vast and neatly manicured lawn, belonging to a public elementary school with a flag waving above it. Two neatly dressed girls wearing sensible shoes converse as they walk away from the school, bent forward at the waist from the weight of their overstuffed backpacks. They appear to be average, innocent-looking middle-school-aged kids, with the exception of their oddly pubescent breasts. A blonde-haired girl with a bob haircut looks defeated as she complains to her worried looking pony-tailed companion, ?So far all we?re learning is how to take a math test, how to take a science test, and how to take a reading test.?

In the same boat as many parents, teachers, schools, taxpayers, and most importantly students, the cartoonist, Bob Englehart opposes standardized testing and the pressure it puts on children. The contrast created in drawing childish-looking girls with untimely large breasts highlights the unnatural pressure placed on children in the U.S., giving the impression that children today grow up too quickly. The anxious expressions on the youngster?s faces imply that they are being pushed to meet the current and increasingly rigid standards, and the overstuffed backpacks illustrate the disproportionate load children are being burdened to carry. If our children were being pushed to actually learn and retain things, the child?s comments at the base of the cartoon wouldn?t be so bad; however they are merely learning how to take tests, which has scary implications for the future.

Originally introduced to classrooms in the 1920?s , standardized tests assess the basic reading, writing, math and science skills of elementary through high school aged students. It wasn?t until the mid 1980?s that standardized testing became political and The National Governors Association came up with the concept of ?performance based accountability? leading to the amendment of Title 1 in 1994 making performance-based accountability mandatory. Under President Bush?s 2001 education reform law, ?The No Child Left Behind Act?, schools must administer twice as many standardized tests and students must meet twice as many standards as before. The Elementary and Secondary Education Act was reauthorized in 2002, tremendously increasing school accountability along with rewards, aid and punishments. If standards are met, schools receive federal funding; if standards are not met, students are held back, teachers are sanctioned or ?let go?, and schools lose funding and are forced to be converted to charter schools or to close.

The politicians claim that putting students, teachers and school administrators in a position of accountability will increase their incentive to strive for higher standards, but unfortunately, the measures with which they assess the standards are biased and inaccurate, and therefore invalid. In light of these facts, I argue that standardized tests are a legal weapon created by and for politicians as yet another way to hold down the masses of poor, which are more often than not minorities.

A current doctoral student, to whom English is a second language, grew up attending Los Angeles public schools where despite excelling in classes, she ?scored unbelievably low on standardized reading tests, up to and including the SAT?, as did the majority of her bilingual classmates. Test questions include phrases such as, ?ball and chain? and ?straight from the horses mouth? reflecting the parlance of white, middle to upper class males.

Frustrated middle school teacher, Don Perl sarcastically ?proposed dumping the Colorado Student Assessment Program (CSAP, Colorado?s standardized test) and using the percentage of students eligible for free or reduced lunches to classify schools?. What Perl is saying is that the results of standardized tests are predictable, and that it isn?t hard to see the obvious socioeconomic disparity and its correlation to standardized test results. The title of The Daily Camera article, ?Incomes are Outcomes in the Classroom?, sums it up well. The article reveals the following statistics: 76 percent of high-income fourth graders are reading at or above the proficient level; while only 43 percent of low-income fourth graders are reading at or above the proficient level. Harvard Magazine reports that schools performing high on standardized tests ?reflect the social capital (high socioeconomic status) of their students rather than the internal capacity of the schools?, and asserts that test-based accountability widens the gap between schools serving the rich and the poor.

As a result of these biases, low income (often minority) children are more likely to be retained in a grade, or placed in a ?lower track? or special/remedial education programs when not necessary, due to test results. Those children will be negatively labeled as ?failures? and from that point on will likely receive a ?dumbed down? curriculum, based on practicing test taking. Alternately, the children from the ?white, middle-upper class income backgrounds will be placed in gifted and talented or college preparatory programs where they are challenged to read, explore, investigate, think and progress rapidly?.

Let?s not measure a child?s potential as it correlates with the financial success of their birth families. Our society was intended to be equal opportunity, not caste-based. Let?s be fair to the youth of our nation and provide them with an education that they deserve, regardless socioeconomic class. Let?s advocate to eliminate consequence based standardized testing.

Copyright 2006-Elle Housman is a freelance writer and graphic designer based in Colorado. Her publications can be found in Toward Freedom Magazine, The Colorado Daily's monthly Women's Magazine, Ujama News and on the website of The Black Biomedical Research Movement. Visit her website at PositiveScribes.com