Stephen Downes

Littered with great quotes and zingers, this article asks, "Who in their right educational mind would want to create a 21st-century system of learning based on the mismeasurement of young children?" The author then launches a sustained attack on the usefuless and reasonableness of standardized testing as a politically motivated ploy against public education and in favour of privatized, standards based learning. He writes, "Those who are most critical of progressive education seek to substitute a back-to-basics education that will actually accelerate the dumbing-down process, rather than reverse it... In other words, the test frenzy will create a dumber, not a smarter America." Wow.