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Pros And Cons Of Standardized Testing

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“At Wake Forest University, we saw more costs than benefits to standardized tests” (Tiefenthaler np). Such tests have been used for many years to predict college preparedness and are thought to be very productive in judging between different students. Several studies performed across the country have found these tests to be insufficient for their use and discovered underlying reasons. Standardized examinations, such as the ACT or SAT, are not the most efficient method of judging a student’s readiness or worthiness for college. One of the assumed advantages to the standardized tests is the ability to judge when to teach students certain material. However, this actually hinders the performance of those who are more advanced in a subject or more. …show more content…

“This does a disservice to both the teacher who worked hard to help their students grow and the student who worked extremely hard over the course of the year and improved tremendously, but failed to score proficient" (“Pros” 3). GPA shows how hard a student worked in class to keep up with their grades and homework. It reflects the responsibility and improvement of students over a year, not on just one particular day. Another disadvantage to standardized testing being a dramatic reflection of a student’s performance is that teachers are held responsible to accordingly teach students to score well on the tests. “Teachers have such pressure to get their students ready for these exams that they neglect to teach students skills that go beyond the tests” (“Pros” 3). The students are only being taught the need-to-know basics. Thus, students are not getting the full benefits from a high school course that could possibly further prepare them for college classes or even life experiences. Finally, an impressive standardized test score does not always correlate to better college performance. “Students with good grades and modest testing did better in college than students with higher testing and lower high school grades” (Sheffer np). Some colleges tend to ignore insufficient high school grades if the student’s test scores are higher than average. This practice, however, does not efficiently judge the future performance as the lower test score student may just be a bad tester and shows his or her hard work through their

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