High Stakes Testing Pros And Cons

I agree high stakes testing has an impact how we teach our curriculum, even in the military environment. We use high stakes testing for promotion to the next pay grade in our enlisted ranks. As educators, our primary goal should be developing curriculum and assessment procedures that improve learning outcomes for our students instead of deterring them. Test like high-stakes actual deters student learning. Amrein & Berliner (2002) suggest, the No Child Left Behind Act high stakes testing policy has caused some unintended consequence in student learning. Those consequences are higher school dropout rates, educator/schools cheating on test to keep or increase their funding, and teachers leaving the profession because of the consequences associated with the testing policy (p.

As a result, some schools are finding it tough to score above average on these test giving teachers no option, but to focus solely on learning outcomes that meet high stake test requirements. Additionally, students with low test score were always pressured by their teacher to achieve high test, scores and when they did not produce higher results, some educator, believed, if they punished the student they would become more serious with schooling and work hard to avoid the pressure or humiliating punishments (Hurley, 2007). I used to be an advocate of high stakes testing, but now I oppose high stakes testing sine I have seen first hand myself the damage it does to a student. Also, I several educators and professional use high stakes test results as a single indicator for measuring a person's competence or determining their future outcome, even though research has proven these tests is highly