Several possible answers (and an essay)

One of our consultants has begun tutoring, which has brought him into contact with the world of standardized tests after many years away.

One of our consultants has recently begun High School and test-prep tutoring, putting in some afternoon and evening hours at a company in the area.  Until the school year gets going, most of his efforts will be directed toward the standardized college entrance tests: the SAT and the ACT.

The purpose of the tests, as seen by the many institutes of higher learning, is to sort applicants into a standard scale that will help to predict how well they’ll do in college.  The purpose as seen by the test makers is slightly different: to show the students’ ability in various subject areas (reading, writing, math, science) and abilities (like abstract reasoning or comprehension of complex ideas).  For both of these groups the ideal test would be one in which a median student gets exactly half the questions right, which would allow the best discrimination of both the highly-able and least-able ends of the spectrum.

Such a test, however, would be ruinous for student morale.  Just imagine doing better than half the class, and still getting half the test wrong!  For the student the purpose of the test is to show how well he or she has learned the material, and a perfect score is a legitimate aim.

Other groups study test results with other purposes.  Teachers use them as some indication of how well their teaching is working.  Higher levels of the secondary school system, up to the state legislature, use them as a guide to how well more general policies are working.  For these, it’s important to have a test standardized from year to year, and individual scores in themselves are not useful.

The tension between tests as a demonstration of learning on the one hand, and as a way to sort out the students on the other, has consequences.  Our consultant noticed many questions on sample tests that were difficult well beyond the nominal subject matter, using various methods to make a straightforward problem very complicated.  The purpose, we believe, is to put extra time pressure on the test-takers, thus sorting out those with an excellent grasp of the material from those who are merely very good.  One effect is to reward students for very careful and attentive reading of each problem.  This is a good practice for students to learn; but we’re not sure it merits the importance it has in these tests.  Another effect is to make the mathematics sections more difficult for those who are less able in English.

And it means that being familiar with the test itself, entirely apart from any grasp of the subjects, becomes very important.  That’s not part of anyone’s purpose.