Standardized Stress: Sleep, Eat, Study

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Standardized Stress
Sleep, eat, study. This is the daily cycle of the typical high school student. He/she must figure out how to learn in widely varying classroom settings, then absorb supposedly “crucial” skills. Unbeknownst to many, the stress of day-to-day activities lead to the buildup of cortisol, which, despite its unassuming name, is linked to a variety of disorders, from severe anxiety to persistent fatigue. Around 1 in 10 American teens suffer from stress-related disorders. The overwhelming majority of this stress is a byproduct of a common and feared tool: standardized tests. Such exams claim to predict college performance in an objective fashion and in large bolded letters. But, they are not as fair as they seem. In reality, the SAT, and its counterpart, the ACT, are poor indicators of college performance.
High school students often struggle with certain types of assessments in a myriad of classroom environments. As a matter of fact, learning styles differ from person to person. There are visual, kinesthetic, and auditory learners. Auditory learners prefer listening to lectures, explanations, and stories. Graphs, pictures, and written words are optimal mediums of learning for those with a visual learning style. Kinesthetics, conversely, are most aware of their body movements, therefore excelling in skits, role playing, and hands-on activities. To illustrate, Lee Grayson, an editor of the online newspaper Demand Media, revealed that “…standardized exams, including the SAT [and ACT], ask questions that…incorporate questions involving reading and writing…” (“Pros & Cons of the SAT Test”). This is important because it demonstrates the areas of intelligence that the SAT and ACT are best suited to, and thus places students...

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...rth Carolina State University, n.d. Web. 17 Apr. 2014.
Fleming, Jacqueline, and Nancy Garcia. "Are Standardized Tests Fair to African Americans?" JSTOR. The Journal of Higher Education, 1998. Web. 17 Apr. 2014.
Grayson, Lee. "Pro & Cons of the SAT Test." Everyday Life. Demand Media, n.d. Web. 17 Apr. 2014.
Murray, Charles. "Abolish the SAT." The American. American Enterprise Institute, July-Aug. 2007. Web. 16 Apr. 2014.
Rooney, Charles, and Bob Schaeffer. Test Scores Do Not Equal Merit: Enhancing Equity & Excellence in College Admissions by Deemphasizing SAT and ACT Results. Institute of Education Sciences, 1998. Web.
Wade, Lisa, PhD. "The Correlation Between Income and SAT Scores." The Correlation Between Income and SAT Scores. Sociological Images RSS, 29 Aug. 2012. Web. 17 Apr. 2014.
"What Does the SAT Really Measure?" PBS. PBS, n.d. Web. 15 Apr. 2014.

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