Why we protested the Achieve summit!

On October 9th, Students Against Testing joined hands with a couple dozen activists around the northeast to make our voices known at the 2001 National Education Summit in Palisades, NY. The summit was an exclusive, invitation-only meeting of presidents, governors, business executives, state superintendents, and media - with no principals, teachers, or most of all, students invited. The single focus of the gathering was to expand "standards-based education" as widely and quickly as possible - which translates into more time and energy focused on standardized testing and less on real learning in classrooms across the nation. Standardized testing has, time and again, proven to be an ineffective, mind-numbing, and racist way of "educating" today's youth.

To learn more:

• An analysis of the 1999 summit from Rethinking Schools.
• The website of the summit organizers, filled with event details and pro-testing press releases, reports, and articles.
• Insiders guide to the testing industry (also available in PDF).
• An article about the 2001 Summit.