High-stakes standardized tests like the ones Bush is proposing can only mean big trouble for small schools.
Illustration: Roxanna Bikadoroff

By Wayne Au

It was hour two of Washington State's mandated standardized test, and Shannon, one of my students at this small public school for former high school dropouts, was wringing her hands over the English section. Brow creased and back hunched over her multiple-choice exam, Shannon was frustrated and angry. Even though it wasn't high stakes, a test like this one took an emotional toll, making her feel inadequate, insecure, and not very smart.

Of course nothing could have been further from the truth. Shannon was smart, but as a white working-class young woman from West Seattle, she was frequently distressed by a myriad of personal issues and everyday dramas. That's why she had dropped out of the big high schools, and that's why she was in my classroom. And even though she was often emotionally distraught over the latest traffic ticket or last weekend's fights, Shannon also exhibited flashes of intellectual ferocity and a real hunger to understand why the world was so messed up—standardized tests and the whole system of education included.

Before the hour was up, Shannon craned her neck toward me and mournfully confessed, "Mr. Au, I'm sorry. But I just can't do it." The look of disappointment on Shannon's face killed me. Even though I had stressed again and again that this test did not measure her worth or intelligence, Shannon could not avoid the matrix of judgment brought down upon her by the state tests. I had told her that the only thing riding on this test was our school's image within the district and that we weren't that worried about it. But Shannon didn't want to let me down personally, as her teacher and an adult who cared for her and provided emotional support.

But support for students like Shannon is shrinking, and the screws of high-stakes "accountability" are tightening on high school students. On Jan. 12, President Bush announced his new "high school initiative" to expand high-stakes testing through the 11th grade under No Child Left Behind (NCLB). Under this new initiative, high school students would be tested in two high school grades in reading and mathematics. Their scores would be calculated into a school's adequate yearly progress (AYP) goals for test score improvement. Ironically, even while the Bush administration is pushing to cut programs that assist low-income students and students of color, the new "high school initiative" allocates $250 million of the FY2006 budget to fund these new tests.