Could The Coronavirus Get Rid of Standardized Testing For Good?
Welcome to the 2020 world. We are in the middle of a pandemic. Kim Jong Un may or may not be dead. Elon Musk and his girlfriend, Canadian singer and musician Grimes, had a baby boy and supposedly named him X Æ A-12, despite the fact that it is illegal in California, where the child was said to be born, to include numbers or symbols in a name.
Now that I’ve gotten you (almost) all caught up, I have to add one more thing: many universities are waiving their required standardized tests for the class of 2021, because, as I mentioned previously, we are in the middle of a pandemic, so testing cannot be conducted safely. And these aren’t just any universities either, we’re talking Harvard and Cornell, just to name two. Many of these schools, like Boston University, say that their reason for going test optional is solely Coronavirus related, but others, like Tufts University, are taking this opportunity to experiment with a three year test-optional policy.
In addition to many schools speaking publicly about why they think waiving standardized tests is necessary at this juncture, Student Voice, a nationally recognized non-profit that encourages students to advocate for themselves, is also pushing for schools to become test optional at this time. They have begun a campaign on social media with the hashtag #TestOptionalNOW.
Schools dropping standardized testing is certainly a plot twist for the College Board, as specific reforms that are being made to the ACT were just announced in October of 2019. High school students everywhere were getting excited about the idea of a new and improved ACT, but I can assure you that now, they are jumping for joy just thinking about not having to prepare for or take an arguably pointless test like those who came before them.
Standardized tests like the ACT and SAT have been a hot topic for quite some time now. In addition to being poor indicators of knowledge and intelligence, standardized tests play a major part in making the college application process insanely selective and socioeconomically unfair. Many students who take the ACT or SAT undergo intense tutoring in order to become more familiar with the testing material, determine the best test-taking strategy to use, and learn any required information they don’t already know. This tutoring becomes very pricey very quickly, giving those who are able to pay for it a significant advantage over those who are not.
Ousting these standardized tests would serve to make the playing field a bit more leveled in terms of the college application and selection process. It would also allow students to focus on giving their all to their schoolwork and the application essays that provide colleges with a more holistic, genuine sense of who they are. There are so many different factors that go into doing well on a standardized test, making it very difficult for one standardized test score to give schools any insight into their potential students. It is unfortunate that it took a pandemic to remind university administrations of this fact, but this may be a silver lining.