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Standardized tests should be abolished
Standardized testing impact on schools
Standardized tests should be abolished
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Recommended: Standardized tests should be abolished
Standardized test are tests given to all test-takers under the same conditions. They are perceived to be a more fair form of judgment to students applying for a higher level of education rather than assessment that use different questions or different conditions of students according to their socioeconomic status, race among other considerations. They are designed in such a way that the questions, scoring procedures, interpretations and their conditions for administering are administered in the best manner they could provide. Colleges emphasize too much on standardized tests. Standardized tests such as SATs’ and ACTs’ are used by almost all colleges and universities to grade their students rather than transcripts. Colleges mainly use this …show more content…
You find a hard working students who has been working extremely hardtop raise funds for college gets nervous during the test. He fails to go to college when his scores prove too low for college acceptance. If only colleges did not put so much emphasis on this tests, this would not have happened. Studies shows that students who do not partake in standardized tests are excellent students in college. Standardized testing ignores the high school performance of a student a solely depends on the results of the test. This is bad since if by chance you fail in such a test, your college life is turned …show more content…
In California this law along with parallel Board of Regents policy, led to decline in minority graduates and increase in undergraduate participation and admission at various campuses in the University of California. In Texas, they passed a law admitting that the top 10 percent of high school graduates went to college with or without the test score results. These changes in policy have also helped, exposing the decisive role that the standardized admissions tests play in restricting access for those who did not pass. This has prompted calls for further reduction in the reliance of the exam. Many schools have dropped the use of the SATs’ and ACTs’ and the results are pleasing. Despite the size of the institutions, benefits from this act have been substantial and satisfactory, including more and better prepared applicants, increased student diversity and positive reactions from the alumni, guidance and counseling and the public (Freeman, 1983). High school students have been encouraged to seek out these schools, sometimes because of their own experiences with test
A scholarly journal written by an anonymous author sheds light on the importance of standardized testing by showing its efficiency in higher level education. This article provides a solid counterargument for the use of standardized tests which is standardized tests being a good source of predicting grades throughout college as well as whether students will stay long enough to graduate. It is also able to establish that the SAT is effective in forecasting a grade-point average through the fourth year as well as predicting students study habits. The
... a tedious process, but the change can have immense, positive effects for the future college student. The ACT and SAT that supposedly measure a student's learning potential through multiple-choice questions should be replaced by a test of a student's desire to learn determined through the analysis of essays, recommendation letters, and school or community involvement. This change can result in a more academically motivated freshman class. Standardized testing in its current form does not accurately measure most students' learning potential. It does not allow for diversity and creates a huge hurdle for many potential academic achievers. An adjustment to a diverse, open testing format of the ACT or SAT and a stress on the student's other academic accomplishments can accurately measure the student's desire to learn, therefore measuring the student's learning potential.
The SAT's have sometimes been the deciding factor when determining a student's admission to a certain college, but recently colleges have stopped regarding SAT scores as the most important factor, and in some cases, colleges are now not even requiring applicants to submit their scores. This change in significance of the SAT's is due to recent controversy over the fairness of the test. According to Fair Test (2001) three hundred and eighty-eight schools do not require applicants to submit their SAT scores, and hundreds more do not place much emphasis on the scores. Because of the recent controversy and the number of schools not looking at or de-emphasizing the SAT's, the College Board, (the company in charge of designing, administering, and grading the test), has decided to make several changes to the format of the SAT's (which was just revised in 1994). These changes will take effect in the year 2005.
Many students feel stressed out when having to take standardized testing. According to Kaplan, colleges are relying too much on the SAT and ACT. They are using a long test that becomes equally weighted to years of school. That seems to be a little lopsided. A student can do well through out all high school and then score badly on the SAT or ACT and ruin all of the hard work that the student put forward in order to acquire good grades. That can alter the students lives by making them have to...
Standardized testing assesses students, teachers, and the school itself, which puts a great deal of pressure on the students. High scores show that the school is effective in teaching students, while low test scores make teachers and schools look as though they are not teaching the students properly. This is not always the case. There are teachers who do teach students what they need to know to pass the test, but their students are still unprepared. Although teachers try to improve instruction, student performance is still variable to other factors that the school cannot control.
These tests can have a negative impact on students as Columbia University recently states that “Standardized testing evaluates a student’s performance on one particular day and does not take into account external factors. There are many people who simply do not perform
Standardized tests, such as the SAT and the SOL, have been implemented for many years now for individuals in grade school to take. The SOL’s, or Standards of Learning tests, are Virginia’s version of standardized tests that students are required to take in order to pass a class, evaluating their knowledge on a specific subject. SOL’s are mandatory for students to take as soon as they reach third grade. Additionally, the SAT is a test taken in the final years of high school that colleges look at when comparing students for post-secondary school. People concerned with student’s education can come to the common consensus that education is important and there should be some way to compare a student’s achievements to one another. However, the process
Standardized tests like the SAT and ACT are on everyone ‘s minds as the November 1st early admission deadline approaches. As a high school senior I know that it is a very stressful time. The competition is intense, we are not only competing with people from our school for a slot in a college class, but we are competing against students across the nation. The competition is between people from every background imaginable; public schools, private schools, AP, honors, and academic classes, wealthy, poor, Black, White, Hispanic, Asian, etc. Students are encouraged to continue their college education at colleges and universities throughout the country; however, many students are discouraged from doing so because of the barriers that standardized tests put up. Every high school senior has one of those secret little numbers, and according to my teacher, that number determines our ability to study and succeed in college. The College Board claims that the SAT is a standardized test, which means that all high school students across the U.S. take the same test. On the surface this assumption seems true, but a closer look reveals test scores that are determined by factors such as money, gender, test anxiety and even race. For most high school students who want to attend an elite college, the SAT is more than a test. It is one of life’s greatest landmarks.
It is often argued that standardized tests such as the SAT and the ACT prepares students for college. Whiles it is impossible to argue they don’t, are we conceding that years of assignments, home works, experiments and research work is not worth more than a day of a test? Have we finally concluded that all those time we spent at high school are not enough to grasp the needed skills to stay in college? I certainly do not think so. In my country, there are three systems of education you can pursue. The American system, the United Kingdom system and the Western-Africa system. From a personal experience, I remember a friend who tested out of the latter system as one of the best in the country but wouldn’t have made most highly selective colleges in the USA with his SAT scores. In a similar situation, I didn’t excel in the West Africa system but made the SAT with impressive scores even though I didn’t pass through the American System. Where do the disparities of these tests come from? It is because certainly different tests measure different abilities. The SAT is basically Math and English but th...
This is one the biggest stress level that a high school student will go through in their junior and senior year. While taking the test students know that if they do not get a certain score on the SAT or ACT, they would not get into college or university they want. Having that state mind is not healthy for young teenagers. According to Where College Admissions Went Wrong, “Students today still spend months and sometimes even years of grueling work to secure a spot, spending thousands on test prep” (Wong Atlantic). Having high school students to spend money for tutors to do better on the test is ridiculous because some student still would not do well. Also with low income students are not able require that type of help to may get a small amount of help. Universities are trying to downgrade their choices or limiting their choices by requiring high school students to get certain score. In today’s society, most of students are not getting accepted because they have high G.P.A but a low standardize test score. Students required both to be high because it is competitive and puts a lot a pressure to on them. For example, Where College Admissions Went Wrong stated, “The intense competition, it fuels undermines students’ well-being; pressures applicants to fine-tune their test-taking skills and inflate their resumes; and distorts the purpose of higher education” (Wong Atlantic). Standardize test give away the higher education to student and defeating the purpose that education is to gain knowledge, not for being a competitive sport. There are colleges and universities that do not have SAT and ACT as required for admission. For example, Minerva schools at KGI, a university that is a live online teaching, does not require SAT and ACT scores to gain entry. As Graeme Wood Said, “SATs are not considered”(Woods 514). These students are doing fine. They are able to do to get a higher
It is difficult for certain population groups to do well on them and they reward “in the box” type thinking. However, they are not without their purposes in the admissions process. It can be complicated to compare grades in classes and GPA’s of students in different high schools because each course’s difficultly level varies. As the editorial board of the Washington Post argued, “No college can possibly know what an A-minus or a B-plus means in each of the thousand high schools their applicants attend” (“Getting Rid of SAT and ACT Testing Is a Mistake”). Basically, it is impossible to compare a student from California that gets an A in Geometry to a student from Virginia that gets a B in Geometry. Curriculum is different, teachers grade differently, and high schools have ways of inflating grades for their own benefit. This is where the importance of standardization comes in with standardized tests. Test like the SAT and the ACT, while not perfect, give admissions offices a baseline evaluator to compare students on. Without standardized test, students cannot be analyzed on equal footing. The danger in standardized tests is realized when schools assign too much value to a single score. It is vital that tests scores are used as what they are: a measure of student intelligence, but also just a number. Standardized tests are necessary in the college admissions process but cannot be the sole reason for acceptance or denial. Even the College Board, administer of the SAT, argues that test scores are best used when viewed in union with grades and extracurricular activities (Juric). If admissions offices are informed about the restrictions and imperfections associated with the SAT and ACT, especially the biases that appear against students from low income families, then test scores can be used
It is time for all universities to reconsider its use of SAT scores as a major factor in college admission and as a predictor of academic success. Women, minorities, and the poor are at a distinct disadvantage because of the test's content and format. It will be interesting to see how the "new and improved" SAT in 2005 will be received. We are skeptical of its acceptance because it is almost impossible to have the foresight to eliminate all underlying biases. The current SAT is not a fair test because it is biased and discriminatory toward women, minority groups, and the poor. It should not be used to determine the future of so many people because the only thing it really measures is how well people take the test.
Colleges use the SAT and ACT aptitude tests to determine a student. These two tests should not be used to determine how good a person is, but other requirements, such as overall high-school GPA and extra-curricular activities, should do so. Because of the weight of these tests on college admittance and scholarship, many students study hard and prepare for a long time to take these tests. This drags the students away from their academic progress and removes any of their remaining free time. Because these tests are placed in such a way that intense preparation is required for succeeding in this test, students from underprivileged families have a difficulty to access prep courses to do well on the exams. Therefore, the SAT and ACT exam scores should not be considered as a criteria for college admissions.
...alified applicants, increase the quality of the freshman class and increase diversity in the freshman class. In 2013, one-fourth of the applications received students did not submit test score which means that 4,000 of these applicants would not have applied if it weren’t for that fact Ithaca was not requiring them. For some students, test scores “conceal more than they reveal.”(us news) Like Ithaca College and American university, many of the other colleges that became optional in terms of test scores noticed the same outcomes. One is that diversity remarkably increased in terms of geography, ethnicity and socioeconomic background. Another is that test sores don’t really matter because the ones that submitted scores and the ones that didn’t have no difference in freshman GPA or in drop-out rates.
However, countless schools have taken a completely different route, because of “the dissatisfaction with standardized tests” (Matthew 1) and have become test optional. Test optional means that students can choose whether or not to submit their scores. Choosing to not submit their scores may exclude applicants from certain scholarship opportunities, but still helps those who have trouble testing or have trouble with receiving scores that don’t reflect their academic