"Tests are everywhere"

"But the person who scored well on an SAT will not necessarily be the best doctor or the best lawyer or the best businessman. These tests do not measure character, leadership, creativity, perseverance." - William Julius Wilson

Next week, my students will be taking yet another test, no, "assessment," to prove to one and all that they are in fact competent in their language.  Interesting how their competency is being made public and a direct correlation to my competency as and English language arts educator. 

But...tests are everywhere and they have been throughout our lives and they aren't the multiple choice kind. What we have forgotten, no, what politics has forgotten, is that assessment numbers do not measure our success.  Perseverance and hard work does.  Excuses for not studying or being responsible for your own educational success don't hold water and I tell my kids that all the time. So where is the common sense?   If the best thing this country's leaders can come up with is numbers across a spreadsheet then we are not the creative, innovative and enriched country that I believed us to be. 

I can sense the huge frustration on the faces of my students because we are asking them to shift their priorities.  Priorities that they already have ingrained from their lifestyles and their home life.  When I was in eighth grade my priorities mirrored the priorities of my parents. They were wonderful, heartfelt priorities.  My parents asked me to be honest, do my homework and try as hard as I could to succeed.  Failure was not an option.  This all came from my parents, not a teacher, or a principal or anyone else.  It came from my home.

My SAT scores were dreadful.  My communication skills and my work ethic were excellent.  Those early SAT scores determined what kind of confidence I would have and what opportunities I would have and I'm glad I ignored them.  But when I got the results, I was immediately told I would be limited. If I had let my SAT scores determine my success then I would never have become a writer, graduated with a Bachelor's, or graduated with honors when I received my masters.  I would never have worked for one of the largest computer companies in the world  or become a teacher. 

On Monday, the day before my students take their "assessment," I'm going to tell them that the real tests aren't on paper or issued from some company that hasn't walked into a classroom.  The real tests come from how ready we are to take risks, dream, fail, and handle the challenges that will never appear on a "canned" test that doesn't take into account whether you've had breakfast, clean clothes or whether you've taken your medication so you can sit still and perhaps write down a note or two.

Tests are everywhere. This is the challenge of being human.  I've failed more than I've passed but the ones I passed were ones I took seriously and that meant something to me. We will win and we will lose and what matters most is that we keep going.  

Until we shift our priorities to nurturing and disciplining our children with common sense and establish our presence as "the adults in the family", test scores will be the easy way out to blame the incompetency of politics as usual. Taking away the video games, the cellphones and the desktop or laptop that are in their bedrooms, is probably not a bad idea either.

The real tests of human beings are measured in the care we take to overcome and succeed despite our difficulties.  "I don't get it," becomes, " I'll work hard to try to get it."  "I can fail," becomes "Failure is not an option."  This is the message we need to teach the young.  Put that in an assessment and then you have something viable.

Professor Wilson from Harvard was correct.  It is all about "character," "creativity," "leadership," and "perseverance." If politics can create a test to measure those attributes then perhaps we can create the kind of educated society that produces innovation, creativity, character and intelligent leaders. Until then, my profession hangs in the abyss of "what next?" And...my students feel the same way.