The Accumulation of Disadvantage: The Role of Educationa Testing in the School Career of Minority Children

Abstract

This paper discusses the ways standardized testing puts children of color and children living in poverty at a disadvantage. This disadvantage begins early in the school career of a child and repeats itself again and again. Education, when driven by standardized testing, is not the great equalizer it is so often portrayed to be in the mythical world where merit counts most.