Test Prep Corruption

As the reading has displayed this test prep teaching is a complicated matter. There are forms of good test prep, but in our education system today it is extremely rare. Because testing is no longer about checking for understanding to ensure good teaching, but the goal of teaching. The test has become the “end goal” when further understanding and knowledge should be. Testing has created an atmosphere of short term memory in which the capacity to quickly memorize and then quickly forget will allow you to thrive in school. It has forced teachers to be more concerned with the statistical outcomes of tests rather than their student’s overall education. Test prep undermines good teaching because it looks for the easiest way to ensure fake results. No longer is it important for the students to understand the information, rather just important they are able to deceivingly display they are able to. So teachers skip steps, and just teach to the test.

In the most corrupting forms, test prep looks like nothing but trying to distinguish different methods to merely earn the quick points on tests without any effort. However, there is a disturbing thought that test prep has corrupted even the best of teachers. As a student I am unaware of the lessons my teachers neglected to do in order to focus on the ones on the test. It most likely happened and I was completely ignorant of that fact, and the skipped lessons. Personally I find this thought to be haunting. How much knowledge have I missed out on? Was this really relevant in my education? Has my mind been molded into the most efficient form of knowledge and nothing else? I don’t know the answers to these questions and it bothers me. The lines between contextual instruction and test preparation have been blurred, as a matter of fact absolutely destroyed. There has been a collision of the two, and test prep has come out victorious. This is seen in Koretz’s work as countless teachers state these high-stakes tests have become the curriculum. Education has become an expedient system of scores which falsely represent knowledge, and it is corrupting the minds of the future leaders of our nation.

Like I said testing in its most pure form is a valid method of gaging student understanding. However, as these tests become more and more destructive to the students development, a new method of gaging is very needed. Though many see this as impossible because testing is so deeply engrained into our education system, there has to be a solution to this issue. We cannot keep treating our students like robots who are programmed to memorize facts in order to reproduce them on exams. Rather we need to cultivate minds which are consistently interested in continuously learning and creating. Personally, I find great satisfaction in methods such as seminars and essays. For these methods require students to actively engage in their learning without the pressure of a test. It’s not about getting the answer 100% right, but rather showing a deliberate effort in learning. These methods allow for a student to display what they have already learned while currently learning as well. While I am aware this is not a solution for the entire issue of testing, if we challenge ourselves to discover new ways of “testing” student success, new methods of learning will be found and the students will thrive rather than just memorize.