More than 53 million students in the United States have found themselves at home as K-12 schools continue to shut their doors in response to the spread of the coronavirus across the country. But what does this mean for the multitude of high school students who have been suddenly halted in their progress toward college? The administration of ACT and SAT tests, two college entrance exams, have been canceled due to the outbreak, leaving test-takers in the lurch and demonstrating that the academic establishment has not only produced a testing regime that has held customers captive for years but has not sought to utilize technology to benefit students. However, one standardized test competitor, the Classic Learning Test, has made inroads into the use of technology, and its effects in the current educational standstill are meaningful for stressed-out students.
The Classic Learning Test has opted to be a different kind of college admissions test, one that seeks to engender a return to educational values that promote intellectual curiosity, truth-seeking, and virtue. But this notion of traditional academic values is also being combined with forward-thinking technological practices. The test’s remote-proctored platform has seen an increase in test-takers and will allow further test administrations this spring as the lockdown continues to bar students from the other two tests. (ACT and the College Board say they are developing digital tests, but they won’t be available until the fall.)
The College Board (the maker of the SAT) and ACT have been the de facto college admissions gatekeepers and as such have been able to drive education policy in this country. The structural changes of their tests and their use as benchmarks have propped up Common Core and generated debate as to whether they actually provide true value in measuring academic achievement.
The Classic Learning Test, however, is providing a market response by providing value to the consumer across various categories, such as the efficiency of remote test-taking and in overall experience — the CLT uses an author bank of intellectual heavyweights and leaders of momentous social movements, such as Thomas Jefferson and Frederick Douglass — versus the SAT and ACT passages, which seem to land on obscure and singularly uninteresting topics.
By providing a test of greater value to students, the Classic Learning Test is seeking to redirect the conversation in education to focus on greater intellectual development and rigor over utilitarian skills transfer.
Change in education has been slow because of monopolistic controls. The College Board and ACT insist on using the levers of government to obstruct new market competitors.
Nevertheless, consumers have great power. Market responses to crises have demonstrated promise for disrupting industries and bringing the shortcomings of entrenched institutions into the sunlight. When faced with this outbreak event that threatens their futures, students have started having questions. So far, it seems that the Classic Learning Test’s free-market response has been the answer.
Tyler Bonin (@TylerMBonin) is a high school teacher based in North Carolina.
