Testing is rapidly becoming radioactive. No one likes it, yet Congress can’t bring itself to drive a stake through the withered, lifeless heart of NCLB, nor call a halt to Race to the Top’s promotion of even more testing.
Jason Stanford says a new film called “Divergent” shows how standardized testing is harming students, determining their future, and inspiring rebellions against it. It will debut on March 21.
He writes:
“Because of its resourceful and tough female protagonist, Divergent will draw comparisons to The Hunger Games franchise. But the popular Jennifer Lawrence movies are all about income inequality and poverty whereas the new film, based on the 2012 bestseller by Veronica Roth, questions whether our children can still determine their own futures.
“The central feature of Divergent is that children are given aptitude tests that sort them by virtues, sometimes separating them from their families. These sorting tests are nothing new in popular young adult fiction. Harry Potter had the Sorting Hat that grouped students based on their innate traits. The Hunger Games held a lottery to single out a boy and a girl for ritualized murder. And in the Percy Jackson novels, only genetics—not skill, talents, or knowledge—could get a child into Camp Half Blood.
“But Divergent, intentionally or not, puts high-stakes testing at the center of the educational dystopia it portrays. As in present-day reality, testing takes time away from classroom instruction and occurs on a single day. The Divergent tests measure aptitude, not comprehension, and serve mainly to sort students according to immutable traits into one of five factions “to determine who we are and where we belong.” In schools, we use standardized tests to figure out whether someone is “college or career ready.”
Who decided that the testing corporations would become the gatekeepers of social and economic privilege?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
When I was still teaching (1975 – 2005) in California, the standardized tests took up an entire week and the class schedule changed to accommodate it and there was more than one test.
Then there was the high school competency test a kid had to pass as one of the steps toward high school graduation. Fail one part of that test—for instance, math, reading or writing—and the kid could not graduate on time even if they had all the units and met all of the other requirements.
It is not possible that a blog entry replete with basic spelling and compositional errors such as this would be written by Diane Ravitch.
Russ, you are SO right! I corrected the errors. I pay a price for not having an assistant, and so do my readers. Sometimes they have to guess what I meant to type. Thanks for your help.
Russ, you copied and pasted a comment I made and I did not proof it. I also did not run it through a spell check. I also didn’t pay a copy editor to check it. Does that offend you?
Remember how the sorting hat in the Harry Potter books put Harry in his house because he wanted to be there? His natural inclinations would have placed him otherwise. H-m-m-m. I just finished Divergent trilogy, and much the same theme was addressed. Are we who some arbitrary tests says we are, or, in spite of those tests, are we defined by more than arbitrary measures?
“Are we who some arbitrary tests says we are. . . ”
Foucault’s “subjectivization” concept would answer that yes, indeed, one can become what the “authorities” say one is.
Just listened to a review of Divergent on NPR and not one mention of standardized tests, or any tests. But that’s NPR for you.
To be honest, I wouldn’t have drawn any connection without Sanford’s contention. Divergent is a dystopian novel for young adults, so it probably should be framed in terms of young adult struggles with identity. We can apply its message to standardized testing, but the parallels are not essential to an informative review.
Just got back from seeing Divergent. The test is injecting the test tackers with mind altering drugs and then recording the results of how you handle your worst nightmares to see what segment of society you would fit in.
Pretty much where the No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top and the Common Core are heading.
Totally agree, Lloyd.
Isn’t that what Gates’ next big thing is, those wrist bands that sense attention and other biologic metrics? Truth has a way of being stranger than fiction.
The strange thing is some of the best US Universities don’t care about testing.