The Trouble with Testing

On Friday one of my best students asked..."do colleges see your state test scores?" I informed her that we now put them on the transcripts, so yes they do. She thought that was ridiculous, saying the test was meaningless to her.

If one of my BEST students has such low value of the state tests that are given each spring to students in grades 2-11, then what did the worst students think?

Sadly, politicians in this country have decided that tests are the only way to measure whether or not a student is learning. The problem is that these tests do not measure where a student started, only where they are on a particular date. If a student skipped breakfast, did not sleep well the night before or has a cold, this can affect their ability to do well on a test. I have had students who develop horrible test anxiety and even though they know a topic and can talk about it one on one with me, or even in a class discussion, they freeze up when given a multiple choice test. There is so much pressure placed on them, they simply cannot cope.

There is zero accountability to the students. If my student decides to fail the test and not even try, there is nothing I can do about it. She still passes my class, she still goes on to the next grade level and she still graduates high school. And yet the public (because the government has told them to) thinks it is important that we hold teachers accountable by evaluating them based on test scores. What is wrong with this picture?

Here is another problem. Teacher A could spend a year in a high performing area like Beverly Hills, where most of her students have parents who value education. As a result the test scores are high. It looks like she is a wonderful teacher. However, if Teacher A went to a low performing area, where most of her students are English language learners, her test scores would drop tremendously. Did she become a bad teacher? NO! Using test scores to evaluate teachers is like evaluating a doctor based on how many patients get the flu or a dentist on how many patients get cavities. Because there is neither an incentive nor a consequence for how a student does on a test, there is no way the teacher can control the outcome. We must first change the way we test before we tie it to teacher evaluations.

Also, the test acts as if all students are the same and expects them all to preform at the same level. A student with a learning disability or one who is still learning the language, is at a significant disadvantage to the average student.

It is time that teachers are consulted on how to best evaluate whether or not our students are learning. Not all students learn in the same manner, so perhaps not all students can show what they know in the same way. But sadly, the test companies make so much money and have huge lobbies, that politicians are blinded. Lets rethink this and make our priority once again LEARNING not TESTING!