As the United States has strived to be continually recognized as the best country in the world, they have fallen victim to the global pandemic known as standardized testing. Individuals, both young and old, are put under what is seemingly constant stress to make sure that they obtain passing scores. Oftentimes, these scores can be directly associated with one’s candidacy for crucial milestones such as career certification, college acceptance, educational placement, and, even in some cases, financial aid for post-secondary institutions. No matter where one turns in their lives, they are met with tests that supposedly “effectively” measure one’s competence in any given subject. In fact, in the United States alone, the PARCC tests are issued to …show more content…
In fact, the existence of this inequality was examined in a study conducted by Professor Jo Boaler of Stanford University in her article titled, “When Learning No Longer Matters: Standardized Testing and the Creation of Inequality,” which was published in volume eighty-four, issue seven of the Phi Delta Kappan. Conducted at a state-labeled “underperforming” high school in the early 2000s, the school, dubbed “Railside High,” was a low-income, high-minority school in urban California who consistently underperformed on standardized assessments, specifically the SATs. As part of the study, Boaler and her team administered mathematics tests to incoming freshmen at three different high schools. Unsurprisingly, it was reported that, “students starting Railside High scored at a significantly lower level than the students starting the other—wealthier—schools” (Boaler 503). However, after one year of studies, students at Railside obtained the highest scores and continued to outperform neighboring schools on these examinations as years went by (Boaler 503). Baffled by these contradictions, Boaler set out to uncover the reason why Railside was underperforming on the SATs when its students were obviously competent enough on independent mathematics