Plagued by the questions, “How will this help us in the ‘real world?” and “Do my grades even matter?” Students and teachers are equally frustrated by the education system that places more emphasis on memorization and standardized testing over truly teaching students and making the “learning experience” enjoyable and effective.
“To me, grades are an unfortunate part of our school that we feel like we have to have,” science teacher Beth Karfs said. “They’ve become like a gateway to get to the next level.”
According to many students – and even some teachers – school, grades, and standardized tests are simply stepping stones on the path of success. With college acceptance on the line, students have little time to focus on the content of exams. Instead, students worry about the mark they will receive.
Like Karfs, many students are frustrated with the current system that rates their knowledge and so heavily influences their plans after high school. GPA and standardized test scores are key when applying to universities, and the stress to succeed not only at college, but in careers, is extremely overwhelming, according to sophomore Matthew Oppenheim.
“You can learn a lot in a class and get a really bad grade or learn nothing in a class and get a really good grade, but colleges don’t see how much you learn, they only see the letter grade,” Oppenheim said. “It’s frustrating, but that’s how it works.”
The main factor in the hostility that arises towards the school system is the intense memorization for tests and weighting of grades, which could result in a good test grade raising your overall grade by maybe one percent, or a mediocre to bad test grade dropping the overall grade a decent amount.
“The weighted grades are good for when you excel in a certain class because your tests will help boost your grade,” sophomore Charlie Rodgers said. “But on the other hand, if you don’t do well on a few assignments or tests then it puts you in a hole that’s very hard to get out of.”
Since the “No Child Left Behind Act” of 2001, standardized testing has come under scrutiny for a variety of flaws, including the idea of “teaching the test,” which raises test scores in some cases, but not the retention of knowledge.
With President Barack Obama’s signing of the new “Every Student Succeeds Act” on Dec. 10, this emphasis on test scores is likely to decrease, however, there will still be an emphasis on student learning.
“Learning provides a foundation for a career, learning is the foundation for a lot of career paths,” Dr. Susan King said. “But learning also teaches your to think for yourself, use context, and analyze, so I think it’s vital life skill for whatever you go into.”
However, the problem doesn’t stop at testing and memorization. The goal of school is to prepare students for the real world and real-world situations, but the influence of social media and messaging instead of talking has had an impact on how society functions and communicates with each other now, making the preparation for the real world that much harder.
“There is actually a report by CEOs that said the No. 1 thing missing from their employees was not the intelligence, not the degree, but the ability to communicate with each other,” math teacher Heather Beal said. “I’d say communication is the number one thing we need to work on because nobody talks anymore. You all text through your phone, you tweet and don’t use real English; you don’t call someone and ask them through the phone. You’re not used to answering the phone when it’s not for you. So, we need to practice communication skills.”
The practicing of communication also ties into the learning experience of many subject areas, but as Beal says, if students are not communicating effectively, that will transcend into the workplace, creating issues in our society.
“So, in math, the problems that you hate are the ones where we make you explain the answers you get; but that’s the whole point of doing a problem: to know what your results mean,” Beal said. “When you go to the real world and you’re doing a presentation and you have all these statistics and you don’t know what they mean or why you’re the best person for the job, then there’s no point of having that data, so you have to explain your answers.”
Standardized tests, while irritating, do have an important function in how our school works, but that may be the flaw.
“In general I think that the government and the state to get any funding has put so much emphasis on testing, that we have to make you memorize stuff so you can pass those tests,” Beal said. “Do I think that’s the most important stuff that you need to know to be successful past high school? No, but in order to keep our school up and running and have a place for you to come to school, we have to.”
The stress of school is an issue long debated, and will continue to be debated for a good amount of time. Opinions will form freely about how it must be run and what the negatives of the system are.