The Negative Consequences Of Standardized Testing

Every year each K-12 student in the United States on average takes at least 6 standardized tests. They spend 8 and a half hours of their school year just taking those tests. These statistics are on the low end, with some students spending up to 25 hours and taking up to 10 tests (Washington Post). These numbers are absurd, and standardized tests even start happening in pre-K school. Standardized tests are a problem that all students who have gone through the public education system in the United States face, and this all started because legislators that had no idea about education and wanted to get the United States higher on the list of the most educated countries. While there are merits to standardized testing, overall the impact that standardized test have on students is more harmful than it is beneficial.

Texas takes the STAAR, Alabama the ARMT, and Hawaii the HSA. Each state in the U.S. has a standardized test required of every student. From the ACT and SAT to the STAAR tests, standardized testing has become common practice for almost every student. The earliest records of standardized testing are when in China, anyone wanting to get a job in government had to fill out their knowledge of Confucian philosophy and poetry in examination. As more and more kids began to go to school during the Industrial Revolution, standardized testing spread as a way to quickly and easily test a large number of students. But not everyone agrees with the tests, stating that they are unreliable, and that the stakes are too high. Standardized tests cause immense amount of stress for not only students, but teachers as well. And the tests might not even be effective, causing more anxiety than it's worth.

When people think of the education system, most can say that there are some problems, though they might not be able to pinpoint what needs to change first. If you ask most teachers, they will say that the first thing that needs to be changed in the schooling system to help the students more is the standardized testing. They will say that while it can be helpful it has a lot of faults and needs to be updated or changed to help its students. Standardized testing has often been a topic for discussion, between parents and people in the schooling system. It seems that a lot of people either hate standardized testing for not giving every child a chance to succeed, or love it for being a fair way to test whether a child knows what they need to know at their age. There have been many articles, books, and documentary’s debating on whether or not standardized testing is doing more harm then good. There was a comic made that shows the brutality and bluntness of what standardized testing is really like. Standardized Testing causes too much stress by putting unfair expectations on teens and doesn’t give every single student the chance to succeed.

Each year high school students from around the country take the SAT or ACT. The ACT and SAT are both standardized test used by colleges to determine the knowledge of a student and predict what their performance will be in their first year of college. An immense amount of pressure is put on student to receive certain scores in order to obtain scholarships and admission into college. Even just one point on a student’s score can determine if they will be accepted into their dream college. However, the results from standardized tests, such as the ACT and SAT, are often inaccurate. Because of this one’s knowledge and academic ability are misrepresented, and they are denied certain opportunities. Standardized tests such as the ACT and the SAT

What is standardized testing? Standardized testing is a test which is given to students to evaluate the knowledge which they know. Testing can be in all subjects and topics in education. In Minnesota there is the MCA ( Minnesota Common Assessment). The MCA can be taken from elementary to high school, and the students are tested on subjects they have learned from the past. In Minnesota the MCA is a test which the government requires students to take. On a national level there is the ACT and SAT. These are usually taken as entrance exams to colleges and universities. ACT and SAT are two different types of test they have differ in grading systems and some colleges take both or one of the two. Why are standardized test given? The test are given so people in charge can evaluate the performance of the student and school; also gage the knowledge of the student. But standardized test like the ACT can not be an effective way to improve instruction and performance because it is a competency focused test. The reason why standardized test are competence: They test students on how well they can eliminate the incorrect answers to find the correct one. This is an inefficient way because what if the test taker crosses out the wrong answer, this forces the taker to choose between two wrong answers. There's needs to be tested efficiently and accurately gage their knowledge.

Today, it can be observed that society has shifted education drastically from the time schools were constituted, to now. Throughout history, schools have gone from private, where only the elite can attend, to public schools where virtually anyone can attend. One of the factors that goes along with education is standardized testing. Frederick J. Kelly, father of the standardized test, once said, “These tests are too crude to be used, and should be abandoned.” Not only has this shift occurred within education itself, but it has occurred within the testing concepts found within standardized testing so much so that the founder of these tests has chosen to give up on it.

Throughout high school and college we will go through a vast amount of testing but why? Testing is used to show a person’s amount of knowledge on a particular subject. Usually it’s for one specific subject and not a majority of them, standardized tests administered in schools today include all testable subjects as in English, Math, Science, Writing, and Reading. However, before we can all take the next step and begin our college careers, we have to take one of two tests, the ACT or the SAT. These two exams demine the college you get into, the amount of scholarships you will receive, and even whether or not your will be accepted into said college, all determined by the score you receive.

Standardized testing is a topic that has been discussed for multiple years, among students, teachers, and many government officials. Standardized testing has been around for more than 150 years. Proposed by Horace Mann, standardized testing was a more appropriate way of testing a student’s ability than the oral exams (Gershon). Standardized testing is “any form of test that requires all test takers to answer the same questions, or a selection of questions from common bank of questions” (“Standardized Test Definition”). Originally, the idea for the tests was dismissed, however, around eighty years afterward, the “most important test of ability”, the Scholastic Aptitude Test, was started

After 1965, preparation for mandatory standardized testing began to take over traditional teaching techniques and curriculum plans in the classroom. These tests are designed to measure a student's skill level in relation to other students who take the same test. Schools are being transformed "from centers of learning to centers of test preparation."(Wetzel,Bill) Teaching to the test has caused an uproar between teachers, students, and administrators globally, nationally, state-wide, and locally. There are many positive and negative perspectives when it comes to standardized testing and teaching solely to the test. Is maintaining a good reputation for schools such a priority that valuable class

On most normal mournings, students can be found showering and eating breakfast before school. This is the normal routine. However, students in Ohio who wake up in March or April find another item added to their routine, stress. These two months are testing months. Tests like the Air, SAT or ACT help determine if a student passes jr. high or high school or gets into college. On these mornings, students worry on their way to school. Most even worry when it comes time to take the test. Stress is just one of the unintended consequences of standardized tests. Even though Standardized tests were made to help keep the classroom teacher and schools accountable, the unintended consequences of them have been hurtful to teacher and students.

In the past years, standardized testing has been taken less seriously that is used to be. Because of this, people are starting to not look at the test scores. This has caused students to not care about the test scores. So, schools should not take standardized testing seriously, because they are not an effective way of assessing what students know and many kids get nervous while testing.

Another scenario when standardized testing wins the debate is when defenders state that a single, annual score helps schools to create a more efficient and higher quality of analysis and comparison. According to Aldemain,

In Florida, there is a huge concern among teachers, parents, and students regarding the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT). They view the impact of standardized testing in fear as it harms the future of their students. Tracy A. Sumpter, who has six years of experience in youth service and public administration says that “For the most part I have seen more of a negative effect of standardized testing on youth’s emotional and social development. Children of testing age seem to suffer from stress in result of worrying about passing the test; and negative results more often than not yield low-self-esteem, higher incidents of seclusion and lower academic progress. Children who pass the test are just happy to be done with it and gain no

In the United States, formulating changes around the results of standardized testing has placed increased demand on school administrators, teachers, and students (von der Embse, Kilgus, & Segool, 2013). The results of these once a year tests have astounding effects on the student population, teacher salary, and how schools receive subsidies (von der Embse et al., 2013). Considering the reach that standardized testing has on all aspects of the educational system, ensuring that the final product effectively embodies the desired skills is vital for all stakeholders (von der Embse et al., 2013). Educators can identify text anxious students through classroom assessments and data driven interventions in order to decrease the influence on student

In today’s modern society things are changing and one thing that many people feel are a waste of time and should go are standardized tests. These time consuming and tedious tests that need to be eliminated include the SAT’s and ACT’s. When children get into high school parents begin to tell their children to start studying for these tests. They tell their children that they need to do well on them to be successful. Realistically these tests are a huge amount of pressure on top of all the work students already have in highschool, and one number on a four hour test does not define how smart or successful someone is.