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High-Stakes Testing: Is It Fair to Students?

One Shot at Success

High-Stakes Testing: Is It Fair to Students? The U.S. House of Representatives just passed a bill that requires states to give math and reading tests to students in grades three through eight every year, and holds accountable those schools that fail to make improvements. Some states already make decisions about funding for individual schools, teachers' and principals' salaries, and even accreditation of schools based on tests scores. Half of all states either have in place or are in the process of implementing the requirement that high-school seniors pass a test in order to graduate.

Is it fair to students when major decisions -- affecting not only their education but in some cases, their future -- are based on the results of a single test? According to the National Center for Research and Evaluation, a student who takes a standardized test a second time may have only a 30-50 percent chance of scoring within 5 points of his initial score. In fact, a score change of as many as 10 points may be completely attributable to the test. Other factors that may influence a test score include whether the child receives clear directions, follows those directions carefully, takes the test seriously, and is comfortable taking tests.

In the world outside of K-12 education, major decisions are routinely based on more than one type of assessment, says John Merrow, author of Choosing Excellence: Good Enough Schools Are Not Good Enough. A medical doctor, for example, wouldn't operate on a patient based on the results of a single test. Instead, the doctor would take a second measurement and look for other indicators. Similarly, college admissions offices never base their decisions solely on test scores. "You don't get into Harvard because you got 1600 on your SAT," explains Merrow. "They use multiple measures, yet we're willing to take a single measure and say this determines whether a student goes on to the eighth grade or graduates from high school."

Peter Sacks, author of Standardized Minds: The High Price of America's Testing Culture and What We Can Do About It, recommends "performance assessments" intended to reflect real-life situations, which could include more open-ended testing questions, portfolios, essays, presentations, exhibitions, and large projects carried out over a period of time. Compared to standardized tests, Sacks says these types of assessments would provide a more accurate gauge of student achievement.

Gary Orfield, an education professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and the Kennedy School of Government, suggests a set of alternative assessments that can be used along with standardized tests. These assessments would reflect different learning styles of students, provide timely feedback, address curriculum actually taught in the classroom, and be developed in collaboration with teachers.

The Loss and the DamageAs the pressure increases for students and schools to perform well on standardized tests, teachers adjust their curricula to fit the content and the format of the tests. In Education Week's special report, "Quality Counts 2001," 66 percent of teachers surveyed said they must concentrate "too much" on what's tested at the expense of other subjects. There is also widespread concern that subjects such as fine arts and physical education will be dropped altogether because teachers don't have time to teach subjects that don't appear on the test.

Maggie Hagan, a teacher at Garfield Elementary School in Youngstown, OH, says, "teaching to the test" emphasizes rote memorization at the expense of more complex skills, such as problem solving. "These tests have eclipsed the opportunities for teachers to engage our students in meaningful activities and projects," explains Hagan. "The curriculum becomes narrowed to accommodate the content on the test."

Many critics contend that high-stakes tests are inherently unfair and often damaging to the most vulnerable students: children of color, those with special needs, and those from low-income homes. Monty Neill of FairTest -- an organization opposed to high-stakes testing -- believes that minority students and students from low-income homes typically have lower test scores because they rarely receive the same education as children from more affluent families. Neill maintains that tests can make assumptions about a child's background and social knowledge, often favoring the background and experiences of white, middle-class students.

In support of this view, Peter Sacks has found that the best indicator of how a student will perform on a standardized test is his or her parents' income and level of education. In light of the correlation between test scores and socioeconomic status, Sack writes, "schools in poor neighborhoods bear the greatest brunt of public and official pressure to raise test scores."

Mary Bostrom, a teacher at John Muir Elementary School in Madison, WI, was relieved when state lawmakers repealed an extensive high-stakes testing policy. "I have trouble with politicians who have never been in a classroom, making these policies for kids," says Bostrom. "Kids (who) have test anxiety, and kids who are on the low end academically, are the ones who would struggle. (They would) get discouraged, and we probably would see more of them dropping out."

Echoing Bostrom's concern, researchers from the National Board on Educational Testing and Public Policy (NBETPP) found that in 1986, nine of the ten states with the highest dropout rates used high-stakes testing, while none of the ten states with the lowest dropout rates used high-stakes tests.

In response to the rise in high-stakes testing, more organizations are taking a critical stance. In recent years, resolutions and policy statements have been adopted by, among others, the American Educational Research Association, National Council for the Teachers of English, National Education Association, National Council for the Teachers of Mathematics, and National PTA. In a January 2001 statement, Paul Houston, director of the American Association of School Administrators, made his organization's position on the dangers of high-stakes testing clear. "Only on Who Wants To Be a Millionaire? can people rise to the top by rote memorization and answers to multiple-choice questions. The final answer to improving education is more than memorizing facts for a multiple-choice test. Children today need critical-thinking skills, creativity, perseverance, and integrity -- qualities not measured on a standardized test." Source: In partnership with National PTA. Adapted from "High-Stakes Testing" in National PTA's Our Children magazine.