Lobbying Post #1: Standardized Testing

Kimberly Bush
October 6, 2010
Science Leadership Academy

I’m lobbying against any federal financial aid giving college that’s using Standardized Testing as criteria for admissions.

All throughout my childhood I’ve been told that I am a smart young woman who is capable of many things. However, it was brought to my attention that when taking tests, my intelligence wouldn’t really reveal itself on this piece of paper. Looking into it, I realized that in reality tests can’t be accountable for every young adults smartness because there are those who aren’t good at test taking, one of them being me. This is the main reason on why I wanted to go to Science Leadership Academy. After hearing about this project based school, I felt as though they understood that there are those who are very intellectual and therefore found a way to surface their creativity. As a Senior, I’m looking back at all the projects I did and wondering if I could have shown this type of creativity and individual uniqueness through tests. The answer would be no. However, now I’m trying to get prepared for college which involves finding the colleges, visiting them, and determining if my SAT scores are high enough for any of them. Not only are the SATs one of the things that can determine if you get the education you want but it also causes a lot of unnecessary stress that builds up until you’re done the whole college application process. This whole process made me wonder what SATs are really about and whether they determined how bright a person is based on the answers to a multiple choice question and their view on a topic. To me, a person can be very insightful and wise even if a test says otherwise because they may have different views and different knowledge that we have never been introduced to.

    The main supporters of my lobbying topic would probably be high school students, parents of those high school students, and those who took the SATs and didn’t get a good enough test score to get into their desired college. Those who probably would not support my lobbying topic would be the colleges with high expectations (i.e. Ivy League Colleges...), those who have very strong test taking skills, and possibly educators.      There is not any type of bill or legislation on my topic that I know of. If there was one to be made, I would like to see what both sides of the topic would propose for the benefit of our youth today. However, I would want to get the opinions of actual high school students too, to see their point of view on this topic. I feel as though you can’t really make a bill without actual concrete evidence. Therefore, if I were in charge of choosing whether or not financial aid giving colleges should use Standardized Testing as criteria for admissions, I would bring together high school students from all around the world with different views and have a big discussion about it. After gathering up data from that event, I would bring together different Representatives from colleges ranging from Ivy League Schools to Community Colleges and have the same discussion with them. Based on the information gathered and the points given I would from there conclude on whether or not Standardized Testing is a good way to represent the intellectual being of a student.

This article states many key factors and details on why Standardized Testing isn’t an effective way on judging the smartness of a student. The writer gives his opinion and backs up his statements with evidence from the actual test itself and those who judge the tests as well.

Here are a few things that he stated in his article:

• “Rather than learning anything of consequence, students are taught how to beat the test.”
• “The essays written on these tests are frequently not scored by educators, but by temp workers, who are paid minimum wage, and who generally spend no more than two minutes on each exam.  According to one former scorer, "There were times I'd be reading a paper every ten seconds.  I know this sounds very bizarre, but you could put a number on these things without actually reading the paper." Furthermore, the scorer added that he and his coworkers were offered a "two hundred dollar bonus that kicked in after eight thousand papers."’
• “Quoting Roger Farr, a professor of education at Indiana University, "I don't think there's any way to build a multiple-choice question that allows students to show what they can do with what they know."’

These are just a few examples in this text that sheds light on the flaws of Standardized Testing.     In conclusion, as a high school senior, I view Standardized Testing as unnecessary and a defective way to represent the intelligence of our youth. Hopefully, later on, this topic will be brought to the attention of those higher up who will realize that there needs to be a change on how we assess our youth. These faulty assessments should not be the criteria that colleges base the future of this world on.

Sources:

http://www.standardizedtesting.net/worst.htm