Essay On Standardized Testing

898 Words4 Pages
Standardized tests have become an integral part of public education for all students in various grades. Many tests are implemented to evaluate whether or not a teacher is adequately covering the benchmarks of their curriculum with their students. There has been debate among educators and administrators alike regarding the accuracy of standardized tests when assessing a student’s skills. Uniform testing can hinder teachers from creating an individualized and creative environment. Also, multiple choice questions can be seen as too simplistic, and many are concerned that students are being burdened with testing. Standardized tests create a high pressure situation, and many students experience testing anxiety. These exams only gauge a student’s…show more content…
A classroom environment typically uses skills such as debating, working in groups, note taking, and balancing school work with extracurriculars. A test will never exemplify a student’s ability to do any of these needed qualities. A Pepperdine article explains that standardized tests truly don't measure intelligence but instead, “What they measure is how well a student can sit and take a test. They measure how well students can learn the tricks to beat the system.” Colleges shouldn’t be so dependent on scores that won’t reflect their students true capabilities. Others could argue that standardized test, specifically the SAT/ACT, give students an opportunity to showcase their abilities against students who had the opportunity to take advanced placement classes. The tests scores can give students an upper hand who are surrounded by similarly skilled peers. However, students who are more active in their school and community with sports, clubs, and other extra curricular activities while balancing difficult classes could be pushed aside if they didn’t preform as well on standardized exams. There are many factors to account for college readiness. For example, “Aspects of an application such as high school GPA are the main determinant of how well a student does at
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