Looking back and into the future, my entire academic life has been constructed around performing well at standardized tests. This intrusion of techno-science into the academic institution has shifted the way students learn and how they problem solve in the real world. For me, it first started in third grade with the Illinois Standardized Achievement Test, then came the Prairie State Achievement Exam and the well-known ACT in high school. I am currently studying for my next standardized test: the Pharmacy College Admission Test, and after that it will be the North American Pharmacist Licensure Examination. As someone who has been studying my whole academic life for a grade on a bubble sheet, standardized testing forces students to look at a problem from only one perspective, limiting the potential growth of a student to a pre-determined set of questions and solutions. These instruments are great at putting students ahead who are quick and efficient at inside-the-box thinking. However, these tests oversimplify and generalize what it means to be 'smart'. Like a map with no scale or topography, these results give no depth to the complexity of what they are trying to portray. It is disappointing to think that these poor attempts at measuring and quantifying intelligence have heavy influences on how a student is viewed and what they can achieve, according to 'state standards'. By categorizing large portions of students into: meets, exceeds, and below standards, these tests not only groom people to problem solve in specific ways, but also separate students into different, unequal classes. I remember in 4th grade I was placed in a separate classroom for students who excelled at math and science due to my scores on tests. However, looking back, doesn't that put all the other students who were only meets or below standards at even more of a disadvantage? The educational system uses these tests to measure students and place them in different classes and career projections, yet these tests do not assess outside experience, interests, or non-academic skills. By honing in on only certain traits like one's ability to read a passage and recall a name, they overlook other skills like communication, in-depth analysis, and creativity that do not necessarily have a single answer that can be bubbled in. While standardized testing is currently viewed as the 'best' blanket method of tracking progression of a student's learning, its consequences on the quality of education, mental health and the future success of its students is quite noticeable.
I agree with your perspective on standardized testing and how it constitutes a “poor attempt at measuring and quantifying intelligence” as you put it. I myself have friends that I consider to be highly driven and intelligent, yet somehow, they received lower scores than I did on the SAT. Ultimately, I see standardized testing as a way of seeing who can best follow orders and, as you said, stay inside the box. And who is it even helping? It reminds me of when my high school principal would enter the classroom to encourage us all to do well and get our school 800 on the CAHSEE—which is the exam that students need to pass to graduate high school in California. It made me question whose interests were ultimately at stake especially because many of these standardized tests are what drive teaching. For example, in AP courses, many of them are geared in the direction of merely helping students pass the AP exam and learn how to answer the questions on those exams rather than actually helping them comprehend the information and critically approach it—not simply absorb it. I think standardized testing is very dangerous since it undervalues people’s potential and overlooks all these diverse forms of intelligence people might have (e.g. artistic/creative intelligence).
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