3 ms·

one sort of wonders what the value in standardized testing is, in a world with such easy access to information.

mschuster91 4y ago
None at all any more, but it would force everyone to a revolutionary project of re-thinking half of how our societies work - and there are a lot of people with deep pockets and heavy interest in keeping the status quo.
thaumasiotes 4y ago
There are two main purposes: 1. You can't look for information if you don't know it exists. 2. Most standardized tests aren't used in the expectation that the testee's knowledge will matter in the future. Instead, the idea is that people who score higher will be generally more competent at whatever it is you want them to do.
- pksebben 4y ago
  >2. Most standardized tests aren't used in the expectation that the testee's knowledge will matter in the future. Instead, the idea is that people who score higher will be generally more competent at whatever it is you want them to do. I fail to see how information retention maps to skill in this case. I guess it could be a vague indicator of the amount of practice done, but some folks memorize so easily, it makes this system incredibly easy to game.
  - thaumasiotes 4y ago
    > I fail to see how information retention maps to skill in this case. It doesn't really matter if you understand why it works; the facts are what they are.
  - newbie2020 4y ago
    From my experience, people who score extremely well on standardized tests do amazingly well in professional/knowledge-based fields. Of the top scorers in my high school class, many are not just doctors, lawyers, engineers, and business-people… but they are _top_ doctors, lawyers, engineers, and business-people. When I hear about those students through the vine, it is like “of course they’re successful - I would be surprised if they weren’t” sort of feeling.
- everforward 4y ago
  > 1. You can't look for information if you don't know it exists. You absolutely can. I don't know if there are stats on the number of people who have circumnavigated the globe in an amphibious vehicle, but I can Google it. I don't know whether the thickness of an electrical cable influences the electromagnetic field it creates, but I can Google it. You can even Google generic stuff like "do charged particles in the atmosphere exert any force on objects at ground level" and get a survey of the forces. That only holds true if you assume people are making very specific queries in an unfamiliar domain. It's entirely possible to start with very general queries in an unfamiliar domain and hone in on a specific piece. It's common in software engineering. I don't understand how databases optimize queries, but I can start with a broad query like "what factors does Postgres use to optimize queries" and slowly hone in on whatever is making my query weird/bad.
barry-cotter 4y ago
Ranking and sorting, much like school. Testing on a standardized body of knowledge allows for sorting on intelligence and conscientiousness and subject matter knowledge.

None at all any more, but it would force everyone to a revolutionary project of re-thinking half of how our societies work - and there are a lot of people with deep pockets and heavy interest in keeping the status quo.

thaumasiotes 4y ago

There are two main purposes: 1. You can't look for information if you don't know it exists. 2. Most standardized tests aren't used in the expectation that the testee's knowledge will matter in the future. Instead, the idea is that people who score higher will be generally more competent at whatever it is you want them to do.

pksebben 4y ago
>2. Most standardized tests aren't used in the expectation that the testee's knowledge will matter in the future. Instead, the idea is that people who score higher will be generally more competent at whatever it is you want them to do. I fail to see how information retention maps to skill in this case. I guess it could be a vague indicator of the amount of practice done, but some folks memorize so easily, it makes this system incredibly easy to game.
- thaumasiotes 4y ago
  > I fail to see how information retention maps to skill in this case. It doesn't really matter if you understand why it works; the facts are what they are.
- newbie2020 4y ago
  From my experience, people who score extremely well on standardized tests do amazingly well in professional/knowledge-based fields. Of the top scorers in my high school class, many are not just doctors, lawyers, engineers, and business-people… but they are _top_ doctors, lawyers, engineers, and business-people. When I hear about those students through the vine, it is like “of course they’re successful - I would be surprised if they weren’t” sort of feeling.
everforward 4y ago
> 1. You can't look for information if you don't know it exists. You absolutely can. I don't know if there are stats on the number of people who have circumnavigated the globe in an amphibious vehicle, but I can Google it. I don't know whether the thickness of an electrical cable influences the electromagnetic field it creates, but I can Google it. You can even Google generic stuff like "do charged particles in the atmosphere exert any force on objects at ground level" and get a survey of the forces. That only holds true if you assume people are making very specific queries in an unfamiliar domain. It's entirely possible to start with very general queries in an unfamiliar domain and hone in on a specific piece. It's common in software engineering. I don't understand how databases optimize queries, but I can start with a broad query like "what factors does Postgres use to optimize queries" and slowly hone in on whatever is making my query weird/bad.

barry-cotter 4y ago

Ranking and sorting, much like school. Testing on a standardized body of knowledge allows for sorting on intelligence and conscientiousness and subject matter knowledge.