<p>In the County I live in, the schools administer CRES Tests, in, English, Mathematics, Social Studies/History, Science, Music, and Art. These test, or I call them: "Take these test to see if you actually learned something in that class" kind of test. Science, there are about 3, in Social Studies/History there are 2, Art has 1, music has 1 or 2 and math has 1. As a terrible test taker, I despise these test. If you don't get a passing average on the CRES test, you don't pass the class. In the eighth grade, in Algebra I my CRES average was 57%, the passing score is 61%. So, I had to retake it my Freshman year. I'm not putting down these test because I failed one, it's because many students in my grade and students else where feel like these test are a waste of time and money. The students' fate are kind of in these tests. The Board did this to enable students to retain facts learned in the class taken. We don't review for these test, nor prepare. It's just given to us. It's hard for students to retain facts from the very beginning of the semester or year and being able to pull an A. Some do, but many don't. These test aren't teaching nor helping anyone, the test are bringing us down, one by one. I believe that it's the students' decision to decide whether they were able to learn and grasp the material themselves, not a test that tells us students where to go, determine and control our education.</p>
<p>What do you think of this test?</p>
<p>Similar test here in Texas being administrated to Freshmen this year. It’s called the STAAR. Have to pass 12 EOCs throughout your HS career to graduate including Biology, Chem, Physics, Alg 1, Geometry, Alg 2, World Geo, World History, US History, English I, English II, English III. Each one counts as 15% of your total grade, which in my opinion, is absolutely absurd, especially considering that nothing is known about these tests, so it makes them impossible to study for. Not only that, but I believe you have to get distinguished on the Algebra 2 and English 3 tests to be able to graduate with the distinguished plan, something I probably don’t have the ability to do in English I because of my disability. </p>
<p>I took them a few weeks back, and they are indeed living up to their reputation. The algebra one was exceptionally easy, but the rest of them were more ambiguous than challenging, giving two answers that are virtually the same or at least both correct, relying you to hope you chose the right one. Luckily the 15% grade was deferred this year, but that doesn’t change the fact that I need to pass all of them to graduate, and also that I most likely need to go to summer school if I even fail one test, despite my straight A average. </p>
<p>Feel bad for you man. Definitely not the way to test the student’s ability in a certain subject. His or her grade should reflect that.</p>
<p>Yeah, even some teachers I know said that they don’t know why these test are given.</p>
<p>We have similar tests like that called SOLs(Standard of Learning).</p>