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Arguments Against Standardized Testing In Texas

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Standardized Testing in Texas Standardized testing in Texas schools has heard the cries of reform for several years. With each new test, there are problems that have to be corrected and it seems like a never ending cycle of reform. The current test, STAAR, State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness, is in need of a major revision for it to be utilized successfully for our students in the upcoming years. “With the implementation of the new STAAR testing system in Texas, there has been an outcry from some parents, educators, and commentators that the state places too much emphasis on standardized testing. They claim that students and educators spend too much time on state testing, the stakes for the tests are too high, and the local districts- …show more content…

They feel that because there has been more standardized testing and the stakes are being raised so that the students are learning more and achieving better results. By holding the schools accountable, they are making sure that if they are not reaching the set goals they will pay a high price so school districts are going above and beyond to try and meet the high demands of the state mandated testing of Texas. “College officials praise exit tests for helping ensure that freshmen are prepared because as the tests become tougher, they may further reduce the demand for remedial education, which now costs colleges an estimated $2-billion a year.” (Schmidt). While it is true that schools do need to be held accountable for what they are teaching and are the teaching the state standards at each grade level, holding a student back a grade level or even withholding a diploma is not acceptable. There could be a middle ground reached between opponents and proponents of standardized testing if the major issues were addressed first which were previously mentioned. High stakes testing is not the way to get opponents on board for standardized testing and not holding schools accountable …show more content…

The League of United Latin American Citizens, LULAC, is a civil rights Hispanic organization that is one of the largest and oldest in the United States. “LULAC advances the economic condition, educational attainment, political influence, housing, health and civil rights of Hispanic Americans” (LULAC). LULAC has consistently been against high stakes testing and been very vocal in their displeasure with the states demands. LULAC’s former Committee Chair for the Texas Chapter, Angela Valenzuela, was part of the resistance to standardized testing in the 1990’s when the state first began denying high school diplomas to students for failing state tests” (Michels). The concern for standardized testing is because they feel that standardized testing is failing their citizens and denying them to get into colleges or to go on to the next grade

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This new assessment tool had two major impacts. First, the expectations for individual students were raised by increasing the difficulty of the material on the assessment—no longer were the tests considered minimal skills tests. Passing each of the reading, writing and mathematics components of the grade 10 test, also known as the exit-level exam, was a requirement for receiving a high school diploma in the state. Second, schools were also held to higher standards with the expectation that not only the campus as whole but the specific subpopulations (African-American, Caucasian, Hispanic, and Economically Disadvantaged) had to achieve minimal standards. Passing rates on these standardized exams, along with attendance and drop-out data were used to assign schools accountability ratings with severe repercussions mandated for schools that were placed at the low end of the accountability scale (Texas Education Agency et al.,

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The state of Texas has been in a constant struggle within itself over just how to evaluate education, and standardized testing in Texas has been a major influencer in terms of the state’s standards for over thirty years. Though these methods of testing have been utilized for decades, resentment to the tests have been continuously rising among educators, parents, and students, but not everyone agrees. Despite government officials trying to quell these protests with changes to administration, and the way the test itself is formatted and formulated, there seems to have been little to no improvement made and those opposing the tests have started calling for an end to all standardized testing. For one to truly understand this ongoing struggle, one must first look at standardized testing’s beginning, then how government today is trying to fix the broken system, and finally consider the opinions of notable figures in the testing world.

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651 Words | 3 Pages

Students are constantly being tested and being graded on these test rather than on school work done throughout the year. However, students and instructors spend most of the school year preparing for state testing, without leaving much room for comprehensive learning. Texas schools are failing our students by teaching them how to test rather than teaching them comprehensive learning or critical thinking skills that will be very useful in their future success. They are neglecting teaching them everyday tasks needed as an adult such as balancing your check book and budgeting your money, only teaching what the government deems they should learn. Test are also being used to determine if a student will graduate and unfortunately many students are failing these tests causing students to fall off track and even some to drop out of school.

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516 Words | 3 Pages

Texas School Testing Learning is an amazing, beautiful, and helpful process of the mind. It lets us recall things that we have come to understand; learn. We learn about the people, the world, the challenges humanity has faced, wars fought over time. Texas has many schools and the main goal for these school 's is that the student 's pass rather than anything else. The only thing is, without understandment and knowledge of what we are supposed to be learning, how are we going to pass these test.

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1754 Words | 8 Pages

These standardized tests are severely damaging the educational system. There is an extremely high budget, and high stakes achievement that rides on your test scores. Although all states use some form of standardized testing, the testing proves to be inefficient, and should be eliminated. As stated above standardized testing proves to be very stressful on the test takers.

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1130 Words | 5 Pages

There are also much better ways to test a student’s capability to learn; a 2006 Center on Education Policy conducted a study and found that a curriculum that follows state standards and uses the test data as feedback led to higher scores than those that prioritized test-taking skills. When teachers are more focused on teaching material rather than test strategies, their students benefit from it (“Do Standardized Tests Show an Accurate View of Students’ Abilities?”). Several alternative methods to state assessments for measuring a student’s academic success include comparing high school graduation rates and the number of dropouts, offering advanced placement courses, and looking at the percentage of the former students that are admitted to colleges. State assessments are more harmful than helpful to students; they are a large cause of test anxiety and a majority of teachers can never fully prepare their students. Although state assessments are an easy way to be able to see the growth of students, that does not mean that they are the best

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282 Words | 2 Pages

Standardized testing ugh. The absolute worst part of school. Testing is so dreadful because it’s time consuming, forget consuming it’s devouring, teachers and students don’t get the graded test back fast enough, and last but definitely not least students already have to study for classroom test weekly now you want to overload their brains! This why I am against standardize test. These test have a desire to devour classroom time and brain capacity.

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894 Words | 4 Pages

Standardized tests are one of the most popular ways schools attempt to evaluate academic intelligence of students, school districts, and teachers. These tests are used more specifically to evaluate student performance in the education system by testing their abilities in mathematics, english and sciences. By giving every student the same test, they are setting a standard idea for how well every student should score on the test, such as the SAT or the ACT, no matter the school or educational process they are receiving. Allowing every student to take the exact same test, gives the state a way to generalize student’s academic intelligence without having to do much work to make the testing one hundred percent fair. Standardized testing in schools should no longer be required because it discriminates against the less wealthy families, does not effectively measure achievement and becomes a distraction to the student’s learning environment.

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662 Words | 3 Pages

Holding School districts, teachers, and students accountable through the process of standardized testing has not improved the nation’s educational status, but worsened it. Students are now being “taught to the test” , and instead of acquiring knowledge they are acquiring the

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1577 Words | 7 Pages

In order to measure students fairly, biases across of different regions and races must be eliminated, along with reducing the number of tests, and eliminating the harsh consequences tied to low test scores (Edwards, “Leaving Tests Behind”). The main supporters of these changes are those directly affected by the results of standardized tests: students, teachers, and other faculty of the school district. Students are most directly effected as they are the ones taking and being graded by the tests. Teachers and school districts are also heavily affected by the standardized tests due to the NCLB accountability program which requires students to reach a specific benchmark score or face the repercussions of possibly having to close the

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462 Words | 2 Pages

Standardized testing has become a part of the way students are educated in the state of Texas. There are some people that believe standardized testing as necessary in order to prepare the student for the real world. Students should not be taught in order to get a high score on an exam, but instead for the sake of furthering the knowledge that they will take with them for the rest of their lives. I believe that there should be an alternative to standardized testing because it does not accurately portray the student's intelligence and potential in a real world setting. Standardized testing is considered to be a linear approach towards assessing a student's learning ability.

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745 Words | 3 Pages

Also, the teacher is having to teach to the test, instead of teaching the subject that is suppose to be taught. In the article “Is the Use of Standardized Test Improving Education in America?”, the author stated, “A five-year of Maryland study completed in 2007 found the pressure teachers were feeling to ‘[teach to the test] since NCLB was leading to ‘[declines in teaching higher-order thinking, in the amount of time spent on complex assignments, and in the actual amount of high cognitive content in the curriculum.]”’ I also read “Pros & Cons of standardized Tests”, the author also stated, “Teachers may end up ‘teaching to the test rather than giving students a deeper understanding of a subject.” ’ In my opinion it’s not fair to students because we get taught how to pass a state test. Teachers are to busy “teaching to the test”, they can’t teach what is needed to be

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483 Words | 2 Pages

One of the arguments about state testing is how state standardized tests affect the amount of money that school is given based on how many students pass. The more students who pass the test help get the school more money and the more students who fail prevent the school from getting the money it needs.  Standardized tests exist for administrative, political, and financial purposes, not for educational ones. Because the amount of kids passing or lack thereof affects the amount of money that school is funding, that becomes the sole priority for these teachers and/or administrators

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2175 Words | 9 Pages

This sends a red flag for the future about the kind of people that will be running the United States. They may be goal oriented, but being people oriented is also an important quality to have. Part of the blame falls upon the educators, administrators, and states for not speaking out, but most of the blame lies with the government for increasing standards in a way that is mentally unhealthy. Standardized tests do not prepare students for reality and skills needed in life. Problem solving for life, which is yet again critical for the adult world, has not been focused on in standardized intelligence tests.

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