Standardized testing rules the world of American education these days, in case you hadn’t noticed. No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top, college admissions and the nation’s very future all revolve around performance on standardized exams. Business leaders, Obama administration officials, big-city school superintendents and opinion-makers all preach that America must raise our test scores, given that we’ve fallen dangerously behind the Chinese, the Finns, the Liechtensteiners and plenty more in the PISA rankings.
That would be the Program for International Student Assessment, given to 15-year-olds in 65 countries worldwide. When the kids from Shanghai aced reading, math and science on their first outing, Education Secretary Arne Duncan said, “We can quibble, or we can face the brutal truth we’re being out-educated.”
Now, critics say that PISA, the SAT and other standardized tests are a lousy way to measure educational attainment or value. But I say enough criticism already. Once you truly understand the awesome power of test scores, you will embrace them, as I have done — especially after realizing how standardized testing proves that I am a better basketball player than Michael Jordan.
Don’t laugh; I have the test results. I read something in a blog somewhere about how MJ recently made 16 out of 20 free throws in a friendly shooting contest. Pretty good, but I thought I could do better. So I went to my local gym and practiced and practiced until I achieved my aim: 18 out of 20 free throws! I’ll send you the video, if you like. (Or you could do what most people do with PISA scores and simply take my word for it.)
You may argue that it’s not a fair comparison, but that’s what so great about this — simply use the same rules we apply to judging PISA scores, and it’s perfectly fair.
So what if it’s not a head-to-head competition? PISA’s not a head-to-head competition. The students take the tests at different times in different places under different conditions. Heck, they take the reading test in different languages.
You say I’ve taken this competition much more seriously than MJ? But that’s the point — what makes you think that American students take PISA seriously? When I tested my teenage son’s knowledge of the PISA exam, he just looked at me quizzically, since he’d never heard of it. Now the SAT we take very seriously, and I just shelled out a sizable chunk of change for an SAT prep class for him. But that test has actual personal consequences attached to it, however tangential or dubious they might be.
Perhaps you think I had an unfair amount of practice. Do you really believe that every student who takes the PISA has the same amount of practice? I earned my superior results through a laser-focused effort on the defined task at hand — free-throw excellence.
What about replicating my results? No one asks PISA test-takers to replicate their results; everyone just accepts the rankings. So if the United States is No. 23 or No. 45 or whatever it is in the PISA rankings, then I am higher than MJ in the basketball rankings.
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