Tony Yarusso's Blog

Now, most people know that I'm not a huge fan of standardized testing. The main reason for that is because schools/districts start obsessing over the results of the tests for their school, rather than just using them as a useful check of actual learning. This leads to the inevitable situation of "teaching to the test", where curricula become tailored specifically towards artificially inflating the school's score distribution. Of course, the tests were never designed to actually be the curriculum for any student, but rather as a rather piecemeal check on what was being covered and what was being absorbed by normal means. Additionally, students pick up on this, and feel even less inclined to put any effort into their own work during elementary and/or high school since they don't see a particular value to it, removing what little may have been left — and that's for the good students.

Now, on to the funny part! Students in Fort Worth, Texas who failed the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills will not be allowed to graduate. Not only will they not receive a diploma, but they can't participate in graduation ceremonies. Now while that makes perfect sense, it seems the students are upset, and would like to be able to walk across the stage even though they can't pass the test. Now, you can read the actual article from WFAA, or, for a far more entertaining experience, just look at this picture of the protesting students/parents. Maybe whatever school you went to somehow thought you were deserving of a 3.5 GPA, but something tells me there's a reason they won't let you graduate, hmm?