If you make a list of the standardized tests administered by the state of North Carolina in our public schools that are both federally and state mandated, then you would still have quite a tally even if NC Finals have been eliminated.

Depending on which math and science track a student has in high school, it is conceivable that a student who matriculates in NC’s public schools will take dozens of these standardized tests.

That list would not include any local benchmark assessments, the PSAT, the ACT, the Pre-ACT, or any of the AP exams that may come with Advanced Placement classes.

Throw in some PISA or NAEP participants. Maybe the ASVAB and the Workkeys.

That’s a lot of tests. And a lot of time to “teach toward a test.”

When I graduated high school last century, I never had to take even one-tenth of these kinds of assessments.

We wrote a lot of essays in my school.

Not short answers graded by algorithms.

Essays.

But we are giving standardized tests in the most non-standard year in recent history to students who were never standard.