Since the beginning of time the human race has struggled to find a way to quantify intelligence. In the early 1900’s the French government asked psychologist Alfred Binet to find a way to identify the students that would struggle in school. Binet and Theodore Simon, his colleague, soon developed the Binet – Simon Scale (Flynn, The Hidden History of the IQ). This scale is still the basis for most IQ tests done today yet, even Binet admitted the scale, and other test like it, had their limitations. Now over a century later tests similar to the Binet scale are still in practice. Today in many parts of the world, including the United States, we determine intellect and persons ability to succeed by scores on standardized tests. This is detrimental to the education of students all around the world. I believe that this practice is unnecessary and should not be used to evaluate students and teachers because, standardized test are often found inaccurate, standardized tests encourage simplistic thinking, standardized tests …show more content…
In the U.S the states spend a combined $1.7 billion dollars a year on standardized tests. To give some prospective that is enough money to buy Instagram or pay the salary of sixty-eight Lebron Jameses, forty Kobe Bryants, and eighty-three Albert Pujolses with some money left over. In some areas, such as the District of Columbia, spending totals to as much as $114 per student. Of this $1.7 billion dollars 96% of it goes to the testing industries big four: Harcourt Educational Measurement, CTB McGraw-Hill, Riverside Publishing (a Houghton Mifflin company), and NCS Pearson. These companies control almost all testing material given at the state level. Even with the advancement of digital testing, spending on NCLB testing continues to accelerate. Are the statistics available to us from standardized testing worth 1.7$ billion dollars? If so, this is the price taxpayers must