Guess I must be old now, I've lived in Oregon all my life and don't know exactly what a CIM test is. I remember having to take SRA tests all the way through grade school, but nothing past that except PSAT/SAT.
At the time I sorta liked those tests. I was always the freak that brought up the school average on SRAs by getting 99th percentile in everything. I've always been a wizard at standardized testing I guess. 1290 on the SATs with zero study time and I didn't bother with the PSAT. The validictorian had to take them four times so I wouldn't have the class high score, he ended up with a 1310.
My freak savant test skills came in real handy in the 3rd grade when my teacher thought I was not as smart as the rest of the class. When she tried to tell my mom I should be held back, mom handed her the test scores and said, and I quote, "I think the problem is that he is smarter than you are." I believe she moved down to teaching 1st grade a couple years later, more her speed I think.
I agree that reliance on standardized testing poses problems, I was a good example of how they can be skewed. Problem is, you can't compare between schools or even larger groups without some kind of equivalent measure. You can't rely on the schools or individual teachers to evaluate everyone the same. Where one teacher may say "Timmy is doing fine in math" another may say "That kid couldn't add one plus one with a calculator and a cheatsheet" There has to be some way to assess how effective schooling is and correct problems where they may be. You don't just build a drag truck and run it without wanting to see a time slip do you?
Given my ignorance of the topic I shouldn't soapbox in on the issue too much. I guess my point is that the tests and testing method are probably not 100% of the problem. I think the problem is likely more in the analysis of the results, and the actions taken based on that analysis. If you don't consider all the contributing factors, the plain results don't mean a whole lot.
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