Kill the Messenger: The War on Standardized Testing

by Richard Phelps, Herbert Walberg (Foreword), J. E. Stone (Foreword)

In response to public demand, federal legislation now requires testing of most students in the United States in reading and mathematics in grades three through eight. Many educators, parents, and policymakers who have paid little attention to testing policy issues in the past need to have better information on the topic than has generally been available. Kill the Messenger, now in paperback, fills this gap.This is perhaps the most thorough and authoritative work in defense of educational testing ever written. Phelps points out that much research conducted by education insiders on the topic is based on ideological preference or profound self-interest. It is not surprising that they arrive at emphatically anti-testing conclusions. Much, if not most, of this hostile research is passed on to the public by journalists as if it were neutral, objective, and independent. Kill the Messenger explains and refutes many of the common criticisms of testing; describes testing opponents' strategies, through case studies of Texas and the SAT; illustrates the profound media bias against testing; acknowledges testing's limitations, and suggests how it can be improved; and finally, outlines the consequences of losing the "war on standardized testing."

352 pages, Paperback

First published July 1, 2003

Reviews

[Michael Connolly · Rating 3 out of 5]

The author makes the point that there must be some way to evaluate the effectiveness of teaching. He defends standardized testing as a good way to check whether the children are learning the material. Critics have criticized standardized testing, because it causes teachers to teach to the test. That is certainly a drawback, but, on the plus side, standardized testing has the advantages that it is objective, and can be used in cross-school comparisons. My personal opinion is that the main thing that is wrong with American standardized testing is that there is too much emphasis on math and reading. The solution is not to eliminate standardized testing, but rather to broaden it to include other subjects, such as history, current events, civics, science, medicine, art and music.