For anyone who has ever worn down a No. 2 pencil while wondering how any standardized test can possibly measure true intelligence, Canadian educational software developer Gerry Morgan may have found a way to assess what really counts.
As an idealistic science teacher in Calgary, Alberta, during the late 1970s, Morgan decided teachers spend too much time preaching behind podiums instead of teaching kids how to think for themselves. "In today’s economy, we don't depend on other people to give us a job," he says. "We depend on our own resourcefulness." Standardized tests such as the notorious SAT and ACT, he concluded, were the culprits.
To teach students more about creativity, insight, teamwork, and flexibility, Morgan loaded an old school bus with Macintosh computers and drove his Merry Prankster classroom to schools in the town of Windermere, Alberta. Students loved the classes, but Morgan needed a way to record and evaluate their learning progress. He found a solution while standing in line at the supermarket.
As he watched the bar-code scanner recording the price of his groceries, Morgan imagined that the same technology could also be used to assess student performance. Inspired by the idea, he invented a simple program called Learner Profile that allows teachers to record observations by swiping a bar code each time a student displays an observable trait such as offering a hypothesis or working well in a team. While Learner Profile isn't meant to replace standardized tests, the system allows teachers to efficiently collect and manage information that enhances a student’s overall performance record. Learner Profile, which now runs on an Apple Newton, is used by nearly 10,000 teachers in the US, Canada, England, Scotland, and Australia. The program has also become the backbone of Morgan's educational software company, Morgan Media.
Authentic-assessment advocates have long criticized standardized tests, arguing that their purpose is largely political, rather than pedagogical. By training students to do well on these tests, they say, schools de-emphasize the skills kids really need.
Even the wonks at the Educational Testing Service, the SAT's authors, are catching on. "Traditional testing assesses the student's ability to answer well-structured, unconditional questions," says ETS research scientist Robert Mislevy. "The real critical skill is to be able to understand a problem and formulate it in a way that solutions can be devised."
Still, skepticism abounds. Mislevy says some authentic-testing methods are cumbersome because they require extensive teacher training. Even if a school can afford assessment technology, he adds, many worry that these methods rely too heavily on the subjective judgment of individual teachers.
Of course, for most parents, success in the college application process remains the ultimate measure of achievement. Yet even in admissions offices, support for more realistic assessment is growing. Stanford University is starting to take authentic assessment more seriously, according to Jon Reider, the school's director of admission, especially as technology makes qualitative data easier to digest. "The SAT will always be an important way to rank students," he says. "But if there is a system that synthesizes more qualitative information, then I think we can start to move away from such heavy reliance on standardized tests."
This article originally appeared in the October issue of Wired magazine.
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