6 ms·

honestly it seems to me that many that bash them are just insecure they didn't do well and therefore claim that it isn't a valid measure.

deepnotderp 9y ago
Well it stands to reason that if a test isn't a valid measure then those who are hurt most by it will be the most vocal complainers. That doesn't invalidate what the complainers have to say. There are numerous studies showing the poor validity of these standardized tests.
- oculusthrift 9y ago
  depends what you mean by validity. they have been shown to strongly correlate with IQ.
majormajor 9y ago
There studies that seem legitimate that have found that a certain amount of prep can boost your score multiple tens of points. This is problematic if you want it to be a valid measure because it lets people artificially close the gap. Do you want the student with such a well-rounded education throughout their life that they got a >=99.9% score without needing to study, or the one who caught up by grinding for a few weeks without that same broad underlying fundamental base? If your test can't tell that apart, it's flawed, because access to the right prep is going to become a significant part of what you're measuring, and that access is (for obvious economic reasons) distributed along unequal lines, reinforcing the already-fortunate. My suspicion, since I doubt we can come up with a test to prep, is that the best answer is either (a) nobody preps or (b) everyone gets access to a lot of prep. The former seems impossible to enforce, plus is the sort of "individual liberty"-constraining thing that the politically dominant swathes of America hate. They want to be able to make their kids the best, they "earned it." The latter would be easier, but isn't without some complications, and of course is time that could be better spent on something other than maximizing a single metric.

deepnotderp 9y ago

Well it stands to reason that if a test isn't a valid measure then those who are hurt most by it will be the most vocal complainers. That doesn't invalidate what the complainers have to say. There are numerous studies showing the poor validity of these standardized tests.

oculusthrift 9y ago
depends what you mean by validity. they have been shown to strongly correlate with IQ.

majormajor 9y ago

There studies that seem legitimate that have found that a certain amount of prep can boost your score multiple tens of points. This is problematic if you want it to be a valid measure because it lets people artificially close the gap. Do you want the student with such a well-rounded education throughout their life that they got a >=99.9% score without needing to study, or the one who caught up by grinding for a few weeks without that same broad underlying fundamental base? If your test can't tell that apart, it's flawed, because access to the right prep is going to become a significant part of what you're measuring, and that access is (for obvious economic reasons) distributed along unequal lines, reinforcing the already-fortunate. My suspicion, since I doubt we can come up with a test to prep, is that the best answer is either (a) nobody preps or (b) everyone gets access to a lot of prep. The former seems impossible to enforce, plus is the sort of "individual liberty"-constraining thing that the politically dominant swathes of America hate. They want to be able to make their kids the best, they "earned it." The latter would be easier, but isn't without some complications, and of course is time that could be better spent on something other than maximizing a single metric.