The debate over the use of standardized testing is a highly controversial issue with several different viewpoints, the most common being that it must be stopped because the negatives outweigh the positives and those believing that the use of testing should continue. One particular viewpoint is the notion that standardized testing, while not perfect, is a crucial part of the education system. While not the most popular viewpoint due to the large movement fighting the use of standardized tests, this viewpoint has a strong group of supporters, mostly consisting of college admissions officers, parents, school administrations, and companies that create the tests. These supporters recognize that the current system of standardized testing could be improved, but still believe that the tests are necessary because they have many benefits. The main benefits of standardized testing that make it so indispensable are its ability to objectively evaluate students in order to provide parents and teachers with information, evaluate the effectiveness of teaching methods, compare the quality of different schools and districts, and accurately measure the success of students for college admissions.
In order for students to receive proper guidance in their education, it is imperative that parents and teachers are aware of their students’ level of academic achievement. While it is fairly effective for teachers to observe their students and use their own judgment to evaluate them, humans are inherently subjective, so parents often choose not to trust the comments of teachers regarding their children. Standardized testing serves as a solution to this problem as it provides an entirely objective measurement of a student’s abilities. In general, parents are in favor of this system and often prefer test scores over teacher evaluations. A survey of over one thousand parents of high school students shows that, “A majority (56%6) of parents believe that standardized tests are fairer than many teachers’ grades, compared to three out of ten (30%) who disagree” (Anderson 99). Parents like the objective and exact results of the tests as well as the idea of seeing how their child compares to their peers. This feedback is valuable to parents as they can be aware of their child’s performance and push them to do better if need be. The test Scores are also very helpful to teachers as they can see which students are below average and give those students additional assistance. They can also track the progress of specific children to determine whether their guidance is effective in helping the children improve. This is very valuable to the school system as the students in need of extra assistance are easily identified and then receive extra attention from the teacher to help them reach the same level as their peers.
Standardized tests are beneficial because they “yield objective information which, in conjunction with teacher observations and classwork, can be of enormous value in planning a student’s educational program at all levels of schooling” (Anderson 107). Aside from the benefit of well-informed parents and teachers, standardized tests are also very helpful in evaluating the effectiveness of teachers and their methods.
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It can be difficult to determine whether a teacher is doing a good job at teaching his or her students due to the fact that the teachers make their own assignment and grading scales. Since each teacher can choose the difficulty of the class, the effectiveness of their teaching methods cannot be determined by looking at the grades of students. The quality of a teacher should be measured based on how much their students learned compared to students who have a different teacher. Therefore, a standardized system of testing is necessary to compare the teachers to one another based on which students were better prepared for the test. With the use of standardized testing, administrators can use test data to evaluate teachers in a fair and objective manner. The test data can also be of use to the teachers in order to be self-aware of their performance. This is especially useful for teachers to see which teaching methods are most effective based on how well they prepared the students for the test. Standardized tests serve as “diagnostic tools that can help both educators and the public begin to understand what educational policy ought to be” (Fruehling 7).
A teacher can observe which teaching style produces the highest test scores and use this information to better themselves as an educator. In addition to the ability to evaluate students and teachers, standardized testing is also useful because it can be used to compare the quality of schools. With many factors impacting it, the quality of a school can be challenging to measure. This poses an issue for parents and students because they would like to know which schools are best to help them choose. When moving to a new area, parents typically try to move into a district with a quality school system. Then, once students graduate high school, they turn to college rankings and statistics to decide which college is best for them. However, these decisions would have little basis without standardized test scores as they “are the best way we have of demonstrating to an increasingly skeptical public that today’s educators are, in fact, educating” (Fruehling 7). According to Fruehling along with many other supporters, these scores serve as the only truly fair and objective measurement of a school’s quality. Of course there are many other factors such as the faculty and the facilities, but test scores are a big part of determining a school’s academic worth. While test scores are helping students choose colleges, they are also helping colleges choose students.
The college admissions process is a complicated ordeal, especially in more selective and prestigious universities. It is in the best interest of the schools to accept only the best students, therefore many factors impact which students will be most successful. While it is important and effective to judge students based on their grades and extracurricular activities, there is not a level playing field between all students that apply based on these factors. However, standardized test scores provide college admission officers with a fair and uniform method of comparing students to one another. Regardless of where the students are from, they are all taking the same tests.
Aside from simply serving as an objective measurement, test scores are also proven to be an accurate prediction of success. A study evaluating the effectiveness of seven different standardized admissions tests has shown that “standardized tests are useful predictors of subsequent performance in graduate school, predict more accurately than college GPA, do not demonstrate bias, and are not damaged by test coaching” (Kuncel, Hezlett 1081). This study makes a strong case for standardized testing because it analyzed seven different tests from varying subjects and still found strong results indicating that standardized admissions are effective.
With the competitive nature of the collegiate community, predicting which students will be successful is important to colleges because they want to admit better students to improve their rankings. Its supporters believe that standardized testing provides an accurate and objective method of comparison for the college admissions officers to use toward their advantage. All of these advantages to standardized testing support that it should remain in use in the education system. Those who support this understand that the system could use improvement but still believe that standardized testing is an indispensable aspect of education due to its ability to objectively evaluate students in order to provide parents and teachers with information, evaluate the effectiveness of teaching methods, compare the quality of different schools and districts, and accurately measure the success of students for college admissions.
