I live in Washington state, which, I believe, is the only state in the nation to have a uniform, standardized test to pass to certain grade levels. This is call the Washington Assessment of Student Learning, or WASL, and it has generated nothing but negative responses within the state. I never had to take it because it wasn't introduced until I was in HS, and I went to HS across the state line in Oregon, but I have several friends who were subjected to it, and my brother was too. All I heard from them is that the teachers were teaching to the test, and no real learning was done; it was basically "This is going to be on the WASL, so remember it."
Among other complaints:
- Almost all students, including moderately to not-so-moderately mentally handicapped students had to take the exam.
- Much of the test is done by human scorers, leading to vast inconsistencies. Example: On the math section, if one gets the question right, but does not show all of his/her work or does it a different way than the "official" way or takes mental-math shortcuts, they will be marked down.
- In 2006, the year it was introduced, these scoring inconsistencies truly came to light, as roughly 50% of all 10th-graders did not pass the math and science sections. And while high schools are certainly full of not-so-bright kids, I severely doubt that half are not well-enough prepared for the next grade. (Note: The test didn't count for anything this time. This was the first time, so it was a "practice run," if you will).
- The man who designed the WASL was paid $1 million to restructure Washington's education system, and after a September, 2006, investigation, it was found that he did so without proper knowledge of the knowledge levels or intellectual abilities of students, leading to unusual content and phrasing of questions in multiple sections.
Additionally, the Washington-state PTA voted unanimously to "oppose any efforts to use a single indicator for making decisions about individual student opportunities such as grade promotion, high school graduation, or entrance into specific educational programs," effectively denouncing the WASL.
As you can see by the US's only required grade-advancement test, there are a myriad of flaws and issues that prevent it from being an effective evaluation tool, some of them being inherent to standardized tests. I do not support the WASL in any way, and when I voted for WA Secretary of Education, I made my selection based on their stance on the WASL (as every other issue was pretty similar. One wanted to reform, the other abolish.)
I got all my facts from
Wikipedia (cited sources only).