Throughout the school year, high school students are subject to an array of standardized tests. These assessments tend to put unnecessary pressure on students and can be used as markers for placement or have rewards placed on good performance. This is detrimental to students’ mental health and creates a competition out of what should be a simple task.
According to a study done by the Journal of Educational Psychology, nearly 70% of students will experience significant anxiety before, during, or after standardized tests. Not every kid learns the same way and not all of what is measured on these tests applies to their abilities. These types of assessments do not provide room for creativity or variation between answers, and often do not take into account the effects of high stakes testing on the mental state.
Many students feel pressure to perform well on standardized tests from their peers, teachers, and parents. Often kids will compare scores with their classmates and begin to feel like they should be doing better than they are, which creates a competition in who can perform the best. This sort of environment takes away from the research aspect of this data and creates standards for performance rather than understanding.
Not only do these assessments cause inefficient learning, but they cause inefficient teaching. With such high stakes testing, many teachers will feel that they should be “teaching the test.” This takes away from them sharing other valuable knowledge that may not necessarily be a part of the exam. Per an article from the IDRA, “High-stakes testing punishes students, and often teachers, for things they cannot control. It drives students and teachers away from learning, and at times from school.”
Teachers who are forced to switch this curriculum generally don’t support standardized testing either. According to a 2015 survey from the National Education Association, 70% of educators do not think that their primary state assessments are developmentally appropriate for their students.
Overall, the harmful effects of standardized testing outweigh any positives. Students are more concerned with getting high results than truly understanding the content. Removing it from our schools would help foster love for learning rather than just goals in performance, and kids would no longer have to deal with the pressure associated with it.
