Thank you for caring a lot about schools and their quality. As a teacher, I have been working hard to improve that quality for over 30 years. That is why I work at a charter school, where we are working every day to find new ways to appeal to students who have been discarded by the traditional system.

However, the screeching about test scores as if they are all-important or all-knowing is very frustrating. We now have whole school systems that are mainly geared to teaching to the tests. There are students out there who feel like they are entering a racetrack each time they read — they believe that reading is all about speed timings and answering questions. We have long since made mathematics about mindless problem-solving; now we are reducing reading and writing to timed, automaton-like skills also. This is because the testing industry has misled us into thinking it can accurately portray the sum total of what a student knows through a three-minute (or three-hour) test.

Unfortunately, this comes precisely at a time when we have learned a lot about the many variations of skills and talent among students. Some are good with people skills, or musical talents, or can visualize scientific breakthroughs like Einstein (who also did poorly in school). There are teachers throughout the country who know a lot more than they are able to carry out, but their districts have them mainly working on rote learning because that is what is tested.

America has gained wealth and prestige because it has always been the leader in innovation. Many of the most innovative schools we have are charter schools. I hope we begin to appreciate them and not just pressure them to become exactly like mainstream schools. They may be our last, best chance to recover some of the creativity and ingenuity that we have lost over these past few years of Back to Basics mentality.

Karen Locke, Bloomington