Essay Against Standardized Testing

Why We Need Alternatives to Standardized Testing When was the last time the United States placed first in global mathematical performance? In the latest score reports, the U.S. didn’t even place in the top 30 countries. Over the last few decades, students in the United States’ public education system have been scoring progressively less in areas such as mathematics and science. As one could imagine, this is a very alarming trend that could be detrimental to the advancement of our country if not addressed properly. Without an emphasis on mathematics, the United States will have a massive decline in progression as it loses more and more prospective occupations such as engineers, physicists, etc. These subjects have become so standardized, that the only way to efficiently correct this problem is to reform the public educational system by deviating away from things such as standardized testing and
Conant developed a test for admissions which is now known today as the SAT (Fletcher). The test was designed to help make college admissions an easier process and choose candidates that demonstrated a knowledge of certain criteria. It wasn’t until the year 2001 with the creation of the No Child Left Behind Act that standardized testing would become so apparent in our current educational system (Holmes 3). While some would like to completely abolish every form of standardized testing, many others would still agree that it is beneficial in moderation. Only with the creation of NCLB would people begin to realize the negative effects of a standards based learning system. Since NCLB especially, standardized testing has acted as a sort of system that divides groups of students based on their intelligence. This would have the potential to be a good assessment only if it wasn’t used to discourage students of their own academic