What do standardized tests really mean? What is their purpose? Why are they necessary? Every educator has witnessed the decline in the rigor of education over the last 30 years. Do you remember a point in your own education where you stayed up all night studying for a test, creating flashcards, making notes, reading the textbook, and collaborating with peers in cram sessions? Do you think students do these same things today? Are they even willing?  The only hints our teachers used to give us were "Read the chapter." I remember once sitting down to read a whole chapter of my Intro to Biology textbook that weighed 15 pounds. I highlighted, I took notes from it, I did the questions at the end of the chapter. I went to the library. Now, students want a video summary of the chapter, so that they don't have to read.


Where are the places that our students live, that allow them the time to focus on studying? In stable households, where a child can devote time and energy to studying. These are generally middle or upper-class households. I was successful in high school and college because I had two working parents who could provide a stable house, a car, utilities, a desk to study at, and the materials I needed. I wasn’t hungry or malnourished, as are many children living in poverty. I wasn’t distracted by siblings screaming and fighting in the background, by a child of my own, or by parents who were in desperate need of money, or they’d lose the family home. Both of my parents were college-educated, and could help me with my homework, and suggest ways to study. Many students these days are not as lucky as I was, but should we not even TRY to educate them in a rigorous fashion? Many teachers have to deal with IEPs, home life problems, gang problems, poverty problems - they feel like they have to prioritize keeping their students alive, and not teaching. And that makes me sad.


As it became required that every student be given a chance at a high school education, some teachers may have become more lax so that students "like them." "Popular teacher, and "hard teacher" aren't words students often mutter together. Many teachers teach things that their students enjoyed, instead of covering the entire curriculum. They began offering study sheets, which helped the students get better scores on their teacher-generated tests. The teacher-generated tests showed no consistency between teachers in the same schools, in the district, or in the state. You knew which teachers had easier tests or were more fun, and you clamored to get that teacher. Teachers found they enjoyed teaching so much more when they didn’t have students complaining about how hard their tests were, so they might have told students what exactly was going to be on the test, allowed an open book test, or even allowed students to take group tests. Is a "good teacher" the one parents and students like, or the one who completely teaches the discipline? I'd like to argue that teachers should be both. Both rigorous, and kind. Both thorough, and thoughtful. Both challenging, and fair. I believe all teachers can meet the objectives of Common Core, while keeping their creative flair.

Teachers, like Jim, who was first mentioned, wish they had a cheat sheet for the test. But in essence, they do. They have the standards. What is going to be on the test is thoroughly outlined. Teachers are free to teach their discipline to the best of their abilities, with their own creative flair, as long as they meet or exceed the bare minimum that Common Core requires. The reason Common Core emerged was because there was no consistency in education across America. Good teachers were frustrated with their students, and began dumbing-down the curriculum. Good students were frustrated by their home lives, peer interactions, and hormones, and put less and less energy into their studies.


Standardized testing points out the gaps in educational quality. Just as a doctor does a blood panel during your yearly physical, and then knows where your levels are at, standardized tests tell us what level our students are at, compared to other students across the country. As Elizabeth points out, “yet we’re not allowed to point out what the problems were,” teachers KNOW where the problems are. We know that students come to our classes unprepared from previous grade levels. We know students transfer from other districts, where they received inadequate teaching. We know students are passed on to the next grade, “because they are sweet,” and not because they are smart. Social promotions are part of the problem - letting a child pass on to the next grade level, even if they didn’t master the concepts, because it seems cruel to hold them back.


I would like to challenge every teacher - Instead of spending your precious teacher-energy complaining about the tests, every teacher in every school should vow to spend all their energy helping these kids pass (as many already do). They should research each lesson in their lesson plan and make it better, by identifying the standard it is meant to teach, and increasing the rigor of their lessons (Make one of your lessons better TODAY. Then, make one better tomorrow. Then one the next day…). They can spend their time helping the entire class, instead of leaving the class sitting and waiting, while the teacher attends to one problem student. Teachers can flip their class, so students can watch lectures at home, and teachers help the students through activities or projects during school. And, teachers can turn to experts to help them make more valuable lessons, deal with students in a way that encourages growth and success, and improve themselves as teachers by reading sites such as edutopia and The Teaching Channel.


I witness so much energy wasted, complaining about the tests. I observe teachers getting burnt out. I feel these students being anxious and frustrated. I see parents angry at the schools. And I see a way to fix this. I worked with The UT Austin. Charles A Dana Center “Professional Teaching Model (PTM).” The premise of the PTM is that teachers collaborate to look at what children should have learned in the previous grade, coming into their class. They identify what the children should learn in this grade. And finally, they assess what children will be learning the next year. Here is a worksheet, that shows how this works. This is an amazing model, because it utilizes teachers as the professionals that they are. It fosters collaboration, and constant improvement. And it accomplishes what we all want - more student success.


If every teacher in every school improved one of their lessons every six weeks, instead of hating the standards, can you imagine the leaps and bounds education would take forward? 

Anyone on social media in the last week has been inundated with articles about evolution versus creation. One very famous scientist, Bill Nye, the Science Guy, debated the founder of “The Creation Museum,” Ken Ham. Nye defended the science perspective, that the Earth is billions of years old and life evolved very slowly via evolution, while Ham described a Young Earth perspective, that the Earth and everything living on it was created by God in 6, 24-hour days and is 6000 years old. In the course of the debate, Ken Ham first claimed that the word “science” has been hijacked, and that things that are now observed in the natural world could have been different in the past, because none of us were there to see God creating everything. Ham says that since the Bible says Earth was created, we should accept that as historical fact. Bill Nye was very detailed in giving evidence for science’s version of events, that every living creature is a descendant of a previous ancestor, and that the fossil records corroborate this. Nye also described how evidence of the biblical flood is not present in the way animals and plants are dispersed throughout the globe, and that a ship the size the arc would have been an engineering marvel, or scientists who described the conditions that would have been necessary for an arc to hold and feed animals for that length of time would have made the voyage impossible.

Whether you believe in the creation story, or you understand the scientific theory of evolution – your mind was probably not going to be changed by the debate. If you are pro-science (and I am very pro-science, as a Biologist at a large, research university) then the words of Ken Ham were probably maddening – every point Ham made came back to “You don’t know that. You weren’t there. But God was there. We have the Bible.” Ham made assertions, not based on evidence, and made them sound like any reasonable person should just get it. Don't understand something? God did it. Can't explain that? God did it. Every possible question, Ham had an answer for, and started with that answer in mind. He looked cool, calm, and confident, with his one answer that explains everything. Nye used scientific evidence like a pro, discussing ice cores, radio-dating, trees older than Ham thinks the Earth is, Neanderthal skulls, and the fossil record. Listening to Ham explain it all away – complete rejection of the data, explaining that historical science is different than observational science because God says so – was enough to make you throw the screen across the room. How can someone like Ham get it so wrong, we scientists wonder?

My son Matthew, who is almost six years old, has a book at home that we sometimes read at night, called “Mythical Beasts.” Described in the pages of this book are creatures like the kraken, a beast so large that 14th century Vikings mistook its tentacles for small islands. These fishermen were known to search for whirlpools left by the kraken to fish over, where the catch would be plentiful. It has been suggested that giant squid, octopus, or whales may have been what were mistaken for kraken, or the water activity may have been over undersea volcanic activity. The legend of the kraken persists today, not just in pop culture and depicted in movies like Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, but in Norwegian and Greenland culture. How could people believe in such a creature, which has been easily explained by the filming of the giant squid in its natural habitat? The kraken is one of my favorite mythical beasts.

My son enjoys the chupacabra, which was a beast I heard a lot about while I lived on the Mexican border. This creature is said to be like a vampire, sucking all the blood out of its victims. The name literally means “goat sucker” in Spanish. I always pictured a rabid, hairless dog – but in some pictures it looks like an alien or deformed rat. Biologist Barry Connor examined the chupacabra carcasses, and found that they were actually coyotes with an extreme case of mange. As late as last week, chupacabra carcasses were examined in Houston Texas, and were determined to be a hybrid species of coyote, wolf, and domesticated dog. But just uttering the word chupacabra can instill fear in people, especially children who might be taunted by a babysitter or sibling, “If you don’t go to bed, a chupacabra might get you!”

Despite the evidence scientists have been able to offer, often proving that these stories have logical explanations, there are people who will continue to believe the story, because of its implications. In the case of the biblical flood – the soul is at stake. If presented with two options – either “believe” science, OR believe in God – which has the biggest implications to the average person? Yeah, it’s that heaven or hell thing. The debate is often phrased so that if you believe the science story, you are damned to burn an eternity in hell. If you were that child, sitting in a classroom, and you were told that if you didn't believe in the biblical flood, you would go to hell, you’d be scared to death! And since we begin telling these biblical stories from a very young, Sunday School age, you can guess which story sits in a person’s mind. Who is this science teacher to come along and say the Earth is billions of years old, when what you've been told from the moment you can remember is that the Earth was created by God in six days, 6000 years ago?

So, as a Biology teacher, I've run into the student who has told me, “I don’t believe anything you say. I’m only in this class because I have to be. I believe in God, end of story.” Even answering all their questions cannot get them to “change their minds.” (This is one of the best articles I’ve read about challenging creationists’ questions, but the title is a bit inflammatory) Over the years, I’ve run into probably a hundred versions of this very statement, even from fellow science teachers! I’ve had moments when I’ve seen fellow scientists call Christians flat-out stupid. I’ve seen scientists' exasperation when “no, 6000 years. Bible says so.” is repeated as “proof.” And in all of my readings on how to make people understand evolution as “very gradual change over time,” I know that all the evidence I provide will not FORCE a person to give up their SOUL – so I’ve had to become an ally, instead of the enemy. I am a scientist who believes you can both be a faithful Christian, and an educated scientist, because religion and science are two different, but not incompatible, ways of knowing about our world. I would like to implore to scientists that they understand the worldview of Christians, and stop giving them such a hard time. Keep calm, science on.

I am upfront with my students that I believe in God. I am also upfront that I believe that science is the way we know about the natural world around us. And then, I go on to teach about the nature of science. I discuss how the Galapagos and Hawaiian island chains were formed. I describe how scientists have studied DNA and genome sequencing, what homologous structures are, how fossils form, how we know how old fossils are, and the science of embryology. I also describe how science works – that we take all the evidence, and use it to formulate an understanding of how the world works. Religion is an entirely separate way of knowing – it starts with an end in mind, an all-powerful God – and works back from that. I personally have had moments in my life that make me “know that God exists.” I have no doubt in my mind. I have faith. My faith does not interfere with my science, and my science doesn't interfere with my faith. In fact, I think one compliments the other. When scientists freak out (which was something that Bill Nye did not do, which is impressive) we alienate Biblical believers from ever understanding science, which hurts science. By making creation the forbidden fruit, we make it something to cling to, and reject science over.

What is the harm in believing in God? What is the harm in believing in the kraken or the chupacabra? There is none. Believing in God gives spiritual guidance to Christians’ lives, and the teachings of Jesus are a moral guidance. Believing in the kraken reminds Norwegians of the power of the ocean, and to be responsible fisherman. Believing in the chupacabra keeps little children in line, listening to their parents. Religions have been used throughout the history of man to guide the actions, both good and bad, explain the soul, describe where we go after we die, and explain how we should act towards our fellow man. Whatever your religion, I, as your teacher, should respect it. And you, as my student, should give me the respect to understand how the discipline of science explains the natural world. So, why should science be taught in schools, and religion be taught outside of school?

There are a multitude of religions. There are even variations of major religions – some Christians say you can be pro-choice, some take objection to homosexuality, Young Earth creationists say the Earth is only 6000 years old – and I’m sure the same is true for Muslims, Jewish people, Buddhists, Native Americans, etc. Religions vary by region, by denomination, and by culture. Scientists would never openly attack a Native American in the classroom - so why do we do it to Christians?  Pick up an intro to Biology textbook. There are virtually no introductory Biology texts that give any credence to creationism, because creationism is not science. Even though university research scientists may believe in God, they are not teaching God as science, because that is not how science works. The fact that there are middle school science teachers and high school Biology teachers – like Ken Ham, who was a high school science teacher – that are teaching creation as science, indicates an alarming problem in education. There is an entire group of science teachers who cannot differentiate science from religion. How can a science teacher not understand enough about the natural world and how science works, to give supernatural phenomenon credence in a science class? That would be analogous to your Biology teacher warning you not to cheat on your test, or a chupacabra would suck out all your blood in the middle of the night. Mythical beasts do not lend themselves to sound science. If you teach one supernatural story to your students, then you have to teach them all. And imagine what a nightmare that would be. How would you feel if public tax dollars were spent to introduce your child to Pagan, Wiccan, or Heathen creation stories, or to the Greek creation myths (think Zues, Gaia, and Choas) as scientific fact?

Some people said it was a bad idea for Nye to debate Ham – it makes it look like there are two equal sides debating – and there aren’t. Just because Ham found five “creation scientists” to make youtube videos, doesn’t mean there are an equal number of evolutionists versus creationists. There are plenty of scientists who believe in God – some of the most faithful people, like myself, believe in God – but who also understand that the Bible is not a science book. Chemistry, physics, geology, astronomy, medicine, and biology all work together as disciplines to explain the natural world. Though scientists may debate the exact mechanisms for evolution, almost no scientist doubts there has been very gradual change in organisms over a very long period of time, billions of years.

Does this really come down to a “teaching religion in the science classroom” agenda? 92 percent say Bill Nye won the debate in Christian Today poll. Because I believe that most Americans understand that the people who wrote the Bible, inspired by God, also were not scientists. They described the world around them with the best understanding of how things worked that they had, at that point in time. Fishermen described the kraken, as a way of understanding the ocean. Latin Americans used the chupacabra as a way of understanding unknown phenomenon. And my son and I settle in to read about mythical beasts, and he understands that these people weren’t stupid – they were using stories to explain the natural world. Many years later, science has helped us understand the Earth in new ways. Just as DNA fingerprinting has allowed over 312 convicted criminals to be exonerated based on the evidence, we learn that eye witness claims cannot always be trusted. The people who were eye witnesses to the Biblical tales did the best they could, but now new evidence has arisen. Evidence, at the end of the day, is what science is all about.

Life is full of tests. To be a doctor, you take many exams through medical school. You take the MCAT to even get into med school. In fact, EVERYONE who goes to med school must pass the MCAT, and almost every US and Canadian medical school requires it. I went and clicked on one of the six topics and skills that are assessed by the test. Just the Biology section had 17 pages of outlined topics you would have had to have studied for YEARS in your undergraduate program. Even as a Biologist myself, there are some topics I would want to go back and review before I’d ever take that kind of test. I am glad that every one of my doctors has had to pass that test, and tests like it, in order to take on the responsibility of being a doctor.


If I want to get into law school, I have to take the LSAT. The LSAT is a standardized test that measures reading skills, analytical skills, and logical reasoning. This test is described as “providing a standard measure of the acquired reasoning and reading skills of law school applicants.” When a student has taken and passed the LSAT, the law school has a reasonable understanding of what this applicant is able to do - read, and reason. I am glad that every lawyer has had to take that test, in order to understand and comprehend the law, and all it's intricacies. 


What, then, do we want from the professionals that are part of our daily lives - our teachers? When I wanted to become a teacher, in Texas, I took the TExES, or the Texas Examination of Educator Standards. As I remember, there were two parts - one part about the subject matter, and one part about understanding teaching. I actually remember the day I took that test. I was living on the Mexican border, and I had to drive to San Antonio for the proctored, secure examination. There were two other teachers with me in the car for the 2 ½ hour drive - one was a teacher’s aide who had completed her coursework, and wanted to move up into a teaching role. The other was an “emergency certified” teacher, like me, except that this was his third time taking the test, and his last try before he would be let go from his teaching position. When you were on an emergency certification (I was, because I had a Biology degree, but no teaching experience. I took all the classes while teaching full time) and you had three years from when you started to pass all the classes, and take the test. If you couldn’t pass the tests, you lost your job.


I had always accepted that this was how the system worked. I was never angry that I had to pass a test. I was never mad at the test, or fearful of the tests. I knew that if I did all the practice tests, reviewed the materials, approached my professors at school about anything I was unclear of, and just took care of business, I’d pass the test. Sure, it wasn’t fun to study. It was tedious. It was boring. It got in the way of some fun stuff I wanted to do on the weekends. But, if I wanted to be a teacher, and I did, I would pass that test. I invited friends over to study. I made binders full of material about each topic, flashcards, even read my study material out loud so I could record it and play it in my car on the way into work. I knew I had it.


(Beware, this paragraph has swearing in it) At the time, I was living with a person who wanted to become a federal agent. He also had to pass a test. He went through 3 months of intense academy to learn to shoot, learn the law, learn the job, and learn Spanish. Then, he had one year from when he started working as a recruit, until he took the test, and would either pass, or get fired from his job. Our attitudes about “the test” were a million miles apart. My attitude was “If I want this job, I take this test. Obviously it’s a test I can pass, because most of my fellow teachers have passed it, so I just need to buckle down and do this.” His attitude was “I hate this f**king test! It’s so unfair that some of these guys are Hispanic, and we are both being tested the same way on if we know Spanish. It’s not fair. If you’re a native speaker, you have an advantage. And what if I’m having a bad day, and can’t shoot? What if I’m sick? What if I can’t remember a stupid little law, or mix it up? I mean, I know the laws in general, but what if they pull out an obscure law and I miss it? This whole test is bulls**t! And my job depends on it! What if I fail, and I have to go get another job? People will know I failed. F**k this, no F**K THIS!!!!”


The closer we got to his year, the more angry, aggressive, and paranoid he got. He didn’t settle in to study - he spent a lot of time bitching with the other recruits. His first topic of conversation at every meeting with another recruit would be “The test… blah.. blah… angry blah.” I noticed that several people, especially the native Spanish speakers, stopped hanging around us. He was mad all the time. He would take his weapon with him everywhere - to the grocery store, to Walmart, to friends’ houses. He treated me in an increasingly hostile manner, because I would ask him if he wanted to study together for our tests, go out to meet new friends I had at the school and their husbands, or go to the gym and exercise (he said all the walking from the job made him miserable and tired). He became known as “Amy’s angry boyfriend.” I made excuses, “He’s just upset about this test. It will pass. He’ll pass the test, and then everything will be fine.” Finally, I broke up with him three months before his test, because I couldn’t live like that. Being surrounded by hostility about the test, anger over studying, constant anxiety about failing, fearfulness about losing a job, and test-aggression was making me physically sick. It was like a disease to all those around us. It weighed on our lives, and broke us apart.


Friends, there are teachers who's attitudes are like mine, and teachers who have an attitude like my boyfriend in your child’s school, who's emotions feed into your child, who are preparing them to take their tests, and ultimately, to graduate. I actually used to be the one designated science teacher who would be assigned every student who hadn’t been able to pass their graduation exam. I worked with these students a period a day, after school, and on Saturdays. I had material for them on EVERY CONCEPT that would be on their tests. I meticulously scoured through old, released graduation tests, figured out which standard the question applied to, and then made mini-tests for my students to take on each assigned topic. I bought them all green highlighters (somewhere I read that if you liked green, you were smart, I don’t know if there is a smart color, but it sounded good) and peppermints (I read that peppermints helped you concentrate), and so any time you came to me for test prep, you got a green highlighter and a peppermint. Somewhere I read that yoga helped people de-stress and focus, so on test days, I would lead my class in yoga pre-test.


One semester I started off with 128 seniors who had failed their senior science graduation exam. I read, re-read, practiced, encouraged, cheer-leaded, and gave them tips and tricks to beating multiple choice tests. I became known as the test whisperer - I could help you pass the test. I knew everything there was to know about that damn test, and I knew how to help students pass it. That year, I got every student to pass except SIX. And I remember those six, very vividly. One girl had such negative talk, that she refused to even read the test. She marked her scantron, and then fell asleep, every time she took the test. She repeated to me often, “I’m a failure. It’s OK, I know I’m not going to graduate. I don’t care anymore.” She set herself up for failure, and no matter what I did, she refused to even try. Another girl refused to speak English. We were on the Mexican border. Even though I never taught in Spanish, I understood it, and she understood me in English, but she would never answer any question in English, no matter what I did. All her other teachers just allowed her to speak Spanish (80% of the teachers on the border are Spanish speaking also), so she refused to do anything but speak Spanish. Another boy was a gang leader, and was only at school to attempt to sell drugs. He was suspended so much that I barely got to see him. When I did have him in class, he was sulking, in a foul mood, and staring into space. He was preoccupied, and wanted nothing to do with me or the class.


Even the best of teachers can’t reach everyone. I consider myself one of the best, most professional teachers there is. I was part of an amazing group of teachers in my department who worked together the make the science experience amazing for our students. And by everything you hear on the news today about students, we should have had utter failure in our school. We had 99% Spanish speaking students. Most of our kids were on free lunch. We had gangs, drugs, students with children, and troubled students. But we all said, “there is no reason we can’t get everyone to pass the graduation tests.” And we were right. We pulled our resources, at our department meeting each week we would each bring our best lessons on a given topic, and then make a plan so that each teacher in the department did that best lesson, and then we revised it together to make it better, make rubric answer keys, make common powerpoints, find labs that worked with that lesson, and made sure it aligned to the standards. We got to be so good at it, that in three years, we went from 39% passing the graduation tests, to 89% when I left the school. We were professionals at getting kids to pass the tests.


And never would I say we “taught to the tests.” We taught everything that was ON the test, sure, but we also got to highlight the topics we loved (one teacher loved plants, and another loved evolution). The labs we did with the students were fun and hands on, and we loved that our lesson planning was a collaborative effort. We never felt alone, because we were professionals who met regularly and took each person’s strengths, and highlighted them. Some days, all the Biology teachers would meet in the lecture auditorium, and bring all their classes of students, and one of the teachers who was really good at the topic would put on an exciting production with multimedia presentations, an outline for the students to take notes, and the other teachers would be out in the “audience,” helping kids who had questions, kids who were sleeping (you all know it happens), or helping students who needed assistance. Mostly, though, these production days were looked forward to by the kids, because it was like watching a concert, with a rockstar teacher leading.


What it took to make this happen was a collaboration between our school, and the UT Charles A Dana Center at The University of Texas in Austin. We did what was called “The Professional Teaching Model.” I plan to write more about it in the future, because it was that program that helped us turn ourselves from troubled, tired teachers, to professional teachers. We were amazing. And it was HARD! But as we all know, teaching is HARD, whether you’re succeeding or failing - so why not make it successful?


And for parents, who would you rather have leading your class? Someone like me, a professional teacher, who is motivating and fun, and hitting every standard and getting your child to pass those tests? Or someone who is constantly bitching about how unfair the tests are, how they hate the standards, and how burnt out and angry they are? A teacher who feels hopeless and angry, or who works with their department and school to be part of a collaborative, professional, efficient, effective team? Who IS your kid's teacher? If you ARE a teacher, who are YOU?


There is a popular author who has a blog that I often see shared who I absolutely despise. I won’t even mention her name, but she’s an educational historian who is what I’d label as a “critical theorist.” She is critical of education, and spends all her time breaking down how bad education is, how bad teachers are treated, how bad politics affect education, how bad the common core is, how bad testing is, and basically how bad EVERYTHING is. She offers no solutions that are feasible. She makes teachers despair even more. She amplifies criticisms, finds faults in the system that she says make it hostile, and writes books to terrorize teachers, and make them afraid. She’s a s**t-stirrer, s**t-flinger, and an irresponsible, critical, worthless hack (in my opinion). And I feel sad for every teacher who climbs on board with her, ready to complain and waste their time fighting against standards. And I plan to write, teach, motivate, and educate until she goes away. I will talk louder, write more, motivate, encourage, and enable success in the profession that I LOVE. Because I believe every school district, every single school, every department, and every teacher is part of this amazing profession called EDUCATION, and that people would prefer to be lifted up, instead of held hopeless to the ground. We all got into this profession to make our lives, the lives of our students, and the education in this country get better. And I, friends, am just getting the ball rolling.


Who’s with me?