Devoted Reader Shakir noticed this Dynamist.com article on accommodations in admissions testing for professional schools:
Over the past decade students with learning disabilities have gotten used to having extra time on tests and, in some cases, separate rooms to reduce distraction. In many cases that makes sense. Giving a dyslexic third grader extra time on a standardized test makes it more likely that his answers will show what he knows rather than how fast he reads.But a sensible accommodation for little kids can create a misleading double standard for adults. How much you know isn't the only thing that matters in school--especially when you're training for a demanding professional job. What patient wants a genius doctor who can't focus in a distracting environment, reads so slowly that she can't keep up with medical journals or tends to misspell drug names on prescriptions?
Read it all, for it is interesting. The point below is particularly appropriate to the argument - yet it's not one you'll often see explicitly stated:
That argument [that tests only measure how good a test-taker you are] denies the fundamental reality of professional schools. No matter how theoretical their classes, these programs aren't about learning for learning's sake. They're trade schools that prepare and certify people for demanding jobs. In those jobs, performance--not intelligence or knowledge--is what matters.Posted by kswygert at March 3, 2005 06:49 AM