Summary
Standardized tests for college entrance, such as SAT in the U.S. and Gaokao in China, have been widely used all around the world to evaluate students’ learning ability. Some people agree that these tests are set to permit reliable comparison of outcomes and are viewed as a way to get the entrance of higher education, while others disapprove that it is the right way to value and measure intelligence, and keep on doing it will have negative impact on promoting equity.
Analysis
Elite colleges and central government favor standardized tests. They claim that standardized test scores are important factors in helping them evaluate a candidate’s potential for success. Meanwhile, making it mandatory allows some low-income students to submit test scores and thus increase their chances of admission. Students with underprivileged background are still welcomed to college in this situation, which also helps prevent students who have access to better resources from monopolizing all high-quality educational resources. Some people hold a similar view yet opposite attitude, for instance some state that central government does not want people from specific area to go to college and get educated as they need people to stay and farm the land. No matter what opinions they have, these ideas are from the perspective of better management and efficiency.
For those who do not approve standardized exams, they think it do not accurately measure student learning and growth. Besides, standardized tests ignore others who do not do well on these tests, with most of them poor, nonwhite or have a learning or intellectual disability. Therefore, setting it for the sake of equality has actually brought more inequality. As for the learning effects of students, they do not have the right to choose how they show learning, and do not enjoy the learning process as well.
While some of the articles from authorized media point out that the negative impacts are due to the misapplication of standardized tests. For example, some test results are directly link to the teachers’ payment or school funding, making them the ends rather than the means. Despite the similar feeling, the tests themselves are not racist or classist but instead reveal them in our society. What we should do is to change the ways we are using it.
There are some interesting facts about these articles. Firstly, only a few of the articles discuss the standardized tests from the view of teachers, which means the majority of article do not regard teachers as the targeted readers who are supposed to echo with and miss a part of the statement from the teaching views. Secondly, the pandemic had an influence on standardized tests. For example, some universities in the U.S. suspended their standardized testing requirements at the beginning of the pandemic, and the percentage of minority students fared far worse than their white peers has increased during the period. Thirdly, it is more common to receive positive or neutral perspectives from the public in some so-called “developed” country as people have more choices and standardized test is just a part of their study, but as for some countries whose students rely on the only one exam to get access to college, standardized tests bring more pain to them and tend to receive more critics.
Sources:
[1] Stetler, P. (August 19, 2024). SATs Have Never Been About Equity. Insider Higher Ed.
[2] Long, C. Writer, S. (March 30, 2023). Standardized Testing is Still Failing Students. NEAToday.
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