Standardized Testing

Standardized test. quite possibly the most feared words of any student. Whether its MCAS, SAT or one of the many, many other tests created to test the comprehension of material by students, there are very few, if any students, who like them. To my surprise however, standardized testing has been around for quite a while. In fact it was used by China during the 7th century to test if a person is suited to work in the government. They were also used in Boston during the 1800's to judge how well each school was teaching its students. The more modern standard testing we know of today came about in 2002 when the No Child Left Behind Act was passed under George W. Bush. This act made yearly testing in math and reading mandatory. From this, schools must be able to show "Adequate Yearly Progress" (AYP) or else the state could take control over or close the school. In 2009, the "Race to the Top Program" was passed as an incentive for schools to become better/have higher standardized test scores. Through this program the top scoring schools split and extra $4.35 billion in funds.

In more recent years, it has been brought up that standardized testing is not an accurate measurement of every students knowledge since people have different ways of learning and demonstrating what they know. However many points have been brought up that standardized testing is the most logical way to test students ability in an equal an non-discriminatory way. While researching this topic I found this blog that pretty much sums up all these main points! Click here to check it out (:


                                                                                                                  ~Ally


Websites Used:
http://greengarageblog.org/12-primary-pros-and-cons-of-standardized-testing
http://standardizedtests.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=006521