When reaching the grade level of a junior and senior in high school, a lot of discussions about future and college education come into play. Many important factors come up while discussing college, including tuition, their cumulative GPA, and their exam scores. These are all determinants of the student's future and where they stand in the competitive application process. In the admission system of our society an important factor is the standardized testing. Students are prompted and pressured to diligently apply themselves so they can get the best potential results. The importance that standardized tests play on the enrollment and acceptance of a student is unfitting and biased. Standardized testing only measures a small portion of what makes education significant. What it dismisses is the importance and valuable qualities in the student. According to education researcher Gerald W. Bracey, PhD, a big part of being a successful student is "creativity, critical thinking, resilience, motivation, persistence, curiosity, endurance, reliability, enthusiasm, self-discipline, leadership, courage, compassion, resourcefulness, sense of wonder, honesty, integrity." Universities have a tunnel vision perception by emphasizing SAT scores, which is an objective learning strategic that does not measure important qualities in a student.
By analyzing the context of standardized tests and the emphases that is set on this like SAT and the ACT, it is evident that these types of evaluations are inaccurate, unsuitably adapted, and stressful because of their unreliability and lack of validity. The two important factors for a test to be successful is validity and reliability. A credible test is defined as actually measuring what the test says it measures. On the other hand, reliability is the ability of the individual to continuously provide the same score. Standardized tests do not offer either of these achievement qualities.
