| Testing sped up under the Bush administration's No Child Left Behind and there has been no slowdown.
TESTING OVERWHELMING NATION'S SCHOOLS
By Lyndsey Layton for The Washington Post
The number of standardized tests U.S. public school students take has exploded in the past decade, with most schools requiring too many tests of dubious value, according to the first comprehensive survey of the nation's largest districts.
A typical student takes 112 mandated standardized tests between pre-kindergarten classes and 12th grade, a new Council of the Great City Schools study found. By contrast, most countries that outperform the United States on international exams test students three times during their school careers.
In a video posted to Facebook by the White House on Saturday, President Obama pledged to take steps to reduce testing overload.
In "moderation, smart, strategic tests can help us measure our kids' progress in school, and it can help them learn," Obama said. "But I also hear from parents who, rightly, worry about too much testing, and from teachers who feel so much pressure to teach to a test that it takes the joy out of teaching and learning, both for them and for the students. I want to fix that."
The heaviest testing load falls on the nation's eighth-graders, who spend an average of 25.3 hours during the school year taking standardized tests, uniform exams required of all students in a particular grade or course of study.
Testing affects even the youngest students, with the average pre-K class giving 4.1 standardized tests, the report found.
READ REST OF STORY: Study says standardized testing is overwhelming nation's public schools
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