STAFF ED: Standardized testing is the wrong approach to measure achievement

Ever since the passing of President George W. Bush's wildly eye-popping, monumentally wrongheaded No Child Left Behind Act, standardized testing has been finding its way into every nook and cranny of the American public education system. It was once a terrible idea inflicted only upon university-bound students in the form of the ACT and SAT, but it's becoming a normal part of life for an ever-growing group of students.

And it's only getting worse. The latest standardized testing fad is increased use of Advanced Placement tests that, if passed, can allow a student to receive university credit while still in high school while also raising the academic prestige of the student's school.

Of course, part of the reason for the increase in AP testing is that college costs are constantly on the rise and earning credits through AP tests can save students and their families money down the road. But attempting to address rising costs for college by introducing more standardized tests is not a solution.

Before universities became knowledge factories meant to crank out dutiful members of the globalized economy, they served a more basic function: to provide an education to their students that could – but weren't primarily intended to – help them find a career. We understand that it's more important students learn how to think than what to think. So using standardized tests to address a problem in our education system is completely wrongheaded since it actually undermines the primary goal of educating individuals. Further, it reinforces the idea that not only is an education no longer the primary goal of the university, but it actually isn't even all that important anyway. All you really need is to acquire a limited skill set that will allow you to become a cog in the global economy.

Standardized testing destroys teacher innovation by forcing them to teach to a test rather than teach the subject given to them in a way that makes sense to them and the students. It destroys student incentive to learn new things by assuring them that all they "really need to know" is going to be on the test. It destroys the presence of the individual in the educational environment by reducing every school to a compliance status, every teacher to a programmer, and every student to a drone whose sole job is to memorize facts.

We could go on.

So while this instance of increased standardized testing is more understandable, it is not any better. If college costs are an issue –and they are– we need to find other ways to fix the problem. You can't fix one problem related to America's public education system by simply exacerbating another problem.

So please, no more standardized tests.

opinion@dailynebraskan.com