The Front Lines or the Front Office?

Throughout my life as a student, I always struggled with poor performance on high stakes standardized tests. By the time I got to college, I was so disgusted with the centrality of standardized testing in my educational trajectory that I wanted to “prove” that testing was biased against students from underrepresented groups. I even wrote my senior honors thesis on how alternative assessments should usurp the powerful placement of standardized tests in high-stakes decision-making processes.  

As an idealistic, college senior, I dreamt of changing the world through education policy. But a wise professor convinced me to join the front lines before I ever considered joining the front office. As a result, I became an educator and, year after year, watched many of my students struggle with the same exact test anxiety and poor test performance as I did. And, year after year, my spirit grew more and more unsettled. Ladened with one part intellectual curiosity and one part rage, I returned to graduate school to learn more about educational measurement.

As a newly-minted doctoral degree recipient, I can say that my rage is gone. Instead of rage, I feel an extraordinary passion for discovering new and improved ways of measuring educational processes, procedures, and products. What does that mean? Could it be that I did a “180?” Instead of standing on the front lines, protesting the big bad testing industry, have I traded my union card for a comfy seat in the enemy’s front office? The funny thing is I no longer see the testing industry as the enemy. Measurement processes can always improve, but test uses must also be analyzed and critiqued. Therefore, I have decided to wear a new hat. I opt to stand on the front lines within the front office. How’s that for a pivotal shift?