After reading Wayne Au's Racial Justice is Not a Choice, I was left feeling a bit uneasy. A line that really struck out to me was that, "standardized testing supports white supremacy" (Au 243). I never thought of standardized testing in this way and found the claim to be a little too bold. After completely reading through the argument, I understand what Au is trying to get at. I can agree that standardized testing comes with immense pressure that "hopes" to close the achievement gap but instead is doing the opposite. Believing that these tests will create racial equality without taking into consideration all other outside forces is absurd. "Test score correlate most strongly with family income, neighborhood, educational levels of parents, and access to resources-all factors that are measure of wealth that exist outside of schools" (Au 244).Au continues the argument that these tests have a history that originated to enforce white supremacy, create rigid curriculum and materials, and place a physical restraint on students taking these tests. All are valid arguments to support the argument that standardized tests are active participants in racial inequality in our classrooms. However, I found this article to be a bit unorganized and almost propaganda-like. Not to say that his argument is not valid, but something about it did not sit right with me.
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I found it interesting that in the beginning of the article, there is a section of five separate quotes all relating around the idea that, "education is a civil rights issue of our time" (Au 243). The quotes date from 2002, 2004, 2010, 2011, and 2017. Clearly this is an ongoing issue that was not resolved with the NCLBA and is currently still something we struggle with in 2018. |
B, thank you for sharing about your personal anxiety when it came to testing in subjects you didn't love. My sister definitely struggles with test taking, even in subjects pertaining to her field. She works herself into a full blown panic attack, and her grade usually reflect this anxiety. This is a real thing, and is something that needs to be taken into consideration when we issues tests to our students. There needs to be a large amount of change in the world of high-stakes and standardized tests, and I hope that it will get easier for our students.
ReplyDeleteI like the cartoons, especially the one wit the boxes. We can't fit all of our students into the same boxes. Some need different shapes!
Bianca,
ReplyDeleteAnxiety, yes anxiety is what I always have when taking tests. I never do well on tests when I am having an anxiety. My daughter and my nephew both deaf and are very brilliant kids, they both always fail tests. Thanks to Washington State’s Office of Superintendent Public Instruction (OSPI), they gave options to pass tests for graduation whether it be ACT, SAT, Core Course, or HSPE (WA’s standardized test). My daughter ended up passing each one in different content. For example, she passed Geometry in Core Course, passed English in SAT, and passed Science in ACT. If she had only one way to do the test in all contents, she would not make it. It is all because of ANXIETY!
I like that you brought up the quote about white supremacy, Bianca. I felt uncomfortable with that line myself because I thought it was laying it on a bit thick, but I understood that Au was using a bit of forceful rhetoric to get the point across. Do I think that standardized testing is some kind of conspiracy cooked up by a task force of Neo Nazis and the KKK? No, of course not. That's just ridiculous and I don't think anyone would support that, but there is truth in the fact that these tests perpetuate the values of white supremacy. Let's face it: the wealth, safe neighborhoods, education opportunities, and resources are funneled mostly to white people. This has been so for numerous generations because power naturally collects instead of dissipating.
ReplyDeleteAnother thing that I appreciated was that you mentioned there are a number of reasons that a student might not get a score that reflects their true knowledge and potential. That really hit home for me because I have really bad test anxiety and there were some instances where I just choked with nerves and I couldn't do things I easily could manage in a low stakes situation.