Standardized tests are assessments put together by experts in the subject and published for use in many different schools districts nationwide. Since the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 was enacted, most states across the United States have adopted standardized test in grade schools. One of the most significant advantage of standardized tests is teachers and schools are held accountable. Educators and schools are responsible for imparting students with the knowledge required to do well in these standardized tests. Standardized scores are public record bringing the focus on teachers and schools that perform poorly .The searchlight on teachers and schools can lead to the loss of job and closure of schools. Another advantage is that high-stakes …show more content…
They are also a good source of data on individual abilities of students and the school as a whole. Finally, high stake tests provides a reports of student progress, this enhances the monitoring of the trend of growth or decline of individual students. One of the most important cons if not the most important disadvantage of high-stake testing is that students’ performance are evaluated on one particular day without taking into consideration of some factors such as some students do not do well on tests, and some students develop test anxiety which affects performance. Another disadvantage of standardized tests is that many educators “teach to the tests”, and this can be a stumbling block to students’ overall learning potential. Finally, standardized testing measures individual performance of a student rather than measuring the overall growth of that student during the course of an academic year. The Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) main objective is to determine if a student is proficient at the time of testing. The teacher and the student hard work and improvements in the course of an academic year growth will go unrecognized, if the student does not pass a standardized