FREE ESSAY ON STADERIZED TESTS

STADERIZED TESTS

Education Needs a Facelift 
Standardized tests are intended to give a general measure of students' performance.
Standardized testing means administrating the same test in the same way to two or more
pupils. Since large numbers of students throughout the country take the same test, they
give educators a common assess or standard of measure. Educators use these standardized
tests to tell how well school programs are succeeding or to give themselves a picture of
the skills and abilities of today's students. Some popular tests include the California
Achievement Tests (the CAT), the Stanford Achievement Test, the Iowa Test of Basic Skills
(the ITBS), and the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale. These test are usually given to
fourth, eighth and twelfth graders. These tests measure your knowledge in math, reading,
science, and spelling. The issue that is concerning the general public today is if this
test should become a mile stone and determine if a student should progress on to the next
level of education. These tests should be made mandatory for all students in primary and
secondary public schools to take. These test results and the results of other students
will be a helpful way to decide the effectiveness of the educational programs in which
they attend. Standardized tests can help teachers develop programs that suit students'
achievement levels in each subject area, such as reading, math, language skills,
spelling, or science. These tests will help the students in the areas that they need help
in instead of sliding throughout school lacking the help they need. These tests will
create it so each student in public schools can have equivalent education.
Standardized tests are the best form to help determine students that need help in
different subject matters. The primary object to look at is how beneficial this could be.
In recent studies done at Cornell University a study was done on States that used
Standardized testing. The research found that the state of Vermont had mandatory laws for
students to take these tests. This state had an overwhelming difference in students who
passed these exams then those in other states. The research went further to evaluate why
this happened. Professor Watson who led the study out of Cornel stated that Main has had
Mandatory testing for the longest time (Arons129). Main is only one example of a state
that has mandatory testing. After every test is given they find the problem areas that
the student has and from there determine what will help the student fix this problem. One
of the ways they do this is by giving the child the extra help they need by the teacher
or a special in the field that the child needs help in. With this type of testing they
can find the problems early on with students' so they do not get to far behind in the
system. 
An additional way these tests can be helpful is to help with the teachers and school
officials to determine how well the teaching system is in the school. Studies have proven
that teachers are for standardized testing according to the University of Pittsburgh
(Woodruff46). The Tests are particularly helpful in assisting teachers in identifying
those students who do better on the tests than the teacher had predicted. This type of
testing also allows assessing the effectiveness of teaching and learning. Results of
tests can be used to compare schools, school districts, colleges, states and even
countries in assessing how effective they are in educating students. In making such
comparisons, it is clear that tests can hold individuals accountable for leadership,
teaching, or learning or the lack of leadership, teaching, or learning (Hazleton 20).
With all this in mind with these test can be very beneficial for schools to keep up with
the education that needs to be taught is schools. These test will make it that all
students in public schools can have equal education by keeping the teachers aware of what
the child needs to know by a certain grade. A study done by Cornell showed that these
tests help give a basic guideline to teachers on where they need to be at during certain
points in the school year (Arons132).
Finally this test will make it so that no student can be socially promoted on to next
step of education with out passing the test. There are however exceptions to this and
each exception would have to be based on the individuals status on learning disabilities.
Studies have shown that about two percent of student in public schools are passed on from
one grade with out the knowledge the need based on the age at the time. This test would
eliminate teachers just passing kids because they felt like it. Keep in mind there would
have to be exception to this rule but for the majority of students this test will
determine if the pass on or have to stay behind to get the help they need. In the study
done by Professor Watson from Cornel showed that twenty five percent of student that
graduate from high school couldn't read or write (Arons132). This is very alarming to
find out considering society feels if you graduate you should be able to read and write.
This is however not the case and with the standardized testing we could make it
impossible for student to graduate from high school who don't know how to read or write.

One of the objections to standardized tests is that they are racially and ethically bias.
Tests are generally developed or chosen to measure as well as possible the skills that
are deemed important for the school system. Many states have increased the programs to
measure all areas of culture not just the majority. Another thing to look at is the area
that these tests cover, like math if you look at math it would not matter what race you
are, all equations equal the same. This would be the same for all the other areas also.
The individuals that make up these exams are all from different backgrounds and cultures
so this helps with the process of making these tests hard to be bias. Good test designers
customarily review their programs for cultural bias and stereotyping, and items are
regularly eliminated if they reflect large groups differences in background
characteristics that affect performance on them (Evra12).
Another objection to standardized testing is those students who are challenged students.
There needs to be specific exceptions to these students, in the states that have these
test those students take a different test that evaluates their learning capacity. Not
every student is the same so those who have some type of learning disability will be
addressed accordingly. One great thing about these tests is that some students' who are
in regular classes need the help for specialist, or have a learning disability that has
not been diagnosed so with these exams the can reach out to those student.
Standardized tests are very beneficial and can be a great way to help better our
education in the United States. These Test are not going to be the only thing to better
our education but they can be a start. Of course there will be a lot of work that needs
to be put into these exams. Standardized tests are a useful tool in the development of
our children. The tests definitely need to be put into our public schools. They are not
only for the students help with education, but are a learning tool for school officials
as well