The following quotes and links to articles are provided for your information. They do not necessarily represent the views of all of the signatories. On the other hand, many certainly do. To suggest a link or to report a dead one, please contact webmaster@xsnrg.com. Happy reading.

"Poor implementation and unintended consequences are fueling a growing rebellion against high standards and tough tests."
High Standards for Whom? by Donald B. Gratz

"At best, the Standardisto documents littering the landscape are irrelevant to the lives of children. At worst, they offer obscenity, poisoning public perception of what schools need to do. Standardistos offer a viciousness that must be laid bare. With Standardistos storming the media ramparts, teachers cannot maintain their preferred role of closing their doors and keeping quiet."
Susan Ohanian, ONE SIZE FITS FEW; THE FOLLY OF EDUCATIONAL STANDARDS, Heinemann, 1999.

"I've come to see standardized testing as an intellectual freedom issue. When teachers are forced to teach to the tests, classroom communities are deprived of the opportunity to ask their own questions, pursue their own projects, dig deeper into topics that interest them, rattle cages, tilt at windmills, question authority, rock boats, challenge oppression, create art, and all the other things that make us fully and freely human. What better way to assure a docile, malleable population than to keep students so busy with reductive skill building that no real questions ever arise?"
Gloria Pipkin, Coordinator, Florida Coalition for Assessment Reform

"It is hard to resist the notion that what is important is whatever we and our peers happen to know. But if we buy that simplistic idea, the clones we create will be poorly prepared to cope with changing reality"
The Standards Juggernaut By Marion Brady

"A plague has been sweeping through American schools, wiping out the most innovative instruction and beating down some of the best teachers and administrators. Ironically, that plague has been unleashed in the name of improving schools. Invoking such terms as "tougher standards," "accountability," and "raising the bar," people with little understanding of how children learn have imposed a heavy-handed, top-down, test-driven version of school reform that is lowering the quality of education in this country."
Articles from Alfie Kohn

"The current standards-based reform movement took off in 1983 in response to the widely held view that America was at extreme economic risk, largely because of bad schools. The battle cry — called out first in A Nation At Risk launched an attack on dumb teachers, uncaring mothers, social promotion, and general academic permissiveness."
New Democracy Forum: Do We Need Educational Standards? Boston Review