Deficits of Standardized Testing in College

Destructive Implications of Standardized Testing At every level education, our instincts are to prize creativity, ingenuity, individuality and competitive excellence. Never is this more so than at the University level, where a great many students are working hard to prove that their unique and individualized talents make them of value in the working world.

However, over the course of recent decades, a growing emphasis on the use of standardized testing to evaluate student ability, aptitude and performance is depriving students of the opportunity to focus on advancing this important and individualized ambitions. As the discussion hereafter will demonstrate, standardized testing is especially out-of-place in the University setting, promoting a one-dimensional way of assessing an incredibly diverse array of students and simultaneously interfering with the far more important pursuit of personal betterment intended by the university experience.

First and foremost among concerns regarding the use of standardized testing is the question of their basic effectiveness. According to Rubenstein (2008), standardized testing methods must be used sparingly and concert with other more intimate measures of student capability. Otherwise, considerable risks exist in vesting too much stock in the metrics produced by such tests. Rubenstein asserts that "today's standardized assessments can be useful for spotting big trends or gauging the effectiveness of state programs overall.

However, when used in high-stakes accountability, as the sole indicator of an individual student's achievement or the quality of a single school or school district, these tests can be imprecise." (Rubenstein, p. 1) This is because standardized tests will tend to carry certain inherent biases toward particular styles of test-taking or particular learning strategies. Many students who do not perform well in such contexts may perform far more ably in written presentation or oral presentation.

But because of the convenience and expedience of utilizing the more easily quantifiable results of widespread standardized testing, a great deal more emphasis is placed on evaluating this area of student performance. A great deal of future educational and even professional opportunity may well hinge on how well a student has performed in the one area subjected to this type of comparative scrutiny. As the article by Fair Test (2007) denotes, the sociological consequences of this can be quite problematic.

Accordingly, Fair Test reports that it is often the most disadvantaged of students that is impacted by the heavy-handed emphasis on standardized testing. Fair Test indicates that "students from low-income and minority-group backgrounds are more likely to be retained in grade, placed in a lower track, or put in special or remedial education programs when it is not necessary. They are more likely to be given a watered-down or 'dummied-down' curriculum, based heavily on rote drill and test practice.

This only ensures they will fall further and further behind their peers." (Fair Test, p. 1) Unfortunately, sufficient evidence is emerging to suggest that these patterns are not accidental and that the biases in core standardized tests may not simply cut across lines of learning style. Even beyond this, the article by Kingman (2010) reports, those responsible for designed and distributing the exams may carry many of their inherent cultural biases into the test design.

According to Kingman, "assessment tests are relied upon heavily by universities and employers to determine candidates' performance potential and have influenced subsequent offers of admission or employment. Well-documented gaps between mean scores of white and minority populations regularly raise the question of racial and socioeconomic bias with regard to how the tests are written." (Kingman, p. 1) This presents universities with a substantial cause to distance themselves from the current emphasis which is placed on standardized testing for conducting formal evaluation and student performance ranking.

Indeed, the article by Neal (2011) calls for nothing short of broad-based policy change, not just in the way that these tests are designed and administered but also in the degree to which these are used as ways of measuring and predicting student performance. As the text by Neal charges, "standardized tests allow colleges to practice social discrimination in the name of academic selectivity, when, in reality, high school grades are the best predictor of future collegiate success" (Neal, p.

1) Unfortunately, the most compelling imperative for this current level of emphasis is one that is unlikely to change. According to Koebler (2011), standardized tests are "quick, for one thing, testing students on a.