I think the worst offender is the idea that people who don't do X cannot sit in judgment of those who do X.
You do realize that this...
the public education system took a reasonable request -- measure your performance -- and turned it into a bureaucratic nightmare.
...was the result of people who don't do X sitting in judgment of those who do X?
We need tests. Period.
IMO this is the root of the problem. We do not need tests. We need judgments about whether a particular student is ready to move on--from grade to grade, from high school to college, from college to a job. The people who should be making those judgments are those who have the facts: parents, teachers, employers, and the students themselves.
Tests are only a tool that can be used towards that end, and they are often a bad tool. You can't encapsulate human judgment in a formula, but that is what standardized tests mostly try to do.
You do realize that this...
the public education system took a reasonable request -- measure your performance -- and turned it into a bureaucratic nightmare.
...was the result of people who don't do X sitting in judgment of those who do X?
We need tests. Period.
IMO this is the root of the problem. We do not need tests. We need judgments about whether a particular student is ready to move on--from grade to grade, from high school to college, from college to a job. The people who should be making those judgments are those who have the facts: parents, teachers, employers, and the students themselves.
Tests are only a tool that can be used towards that end, and they are often a bad tool. You can't encapsulate human judgment in a formula, but that is what standardized tests mostly try to do.