“Testing issues today are sucking the oxygen out of the room in a lot of schools,” admits the US Education Secretary Arne Duncan. The suffocation of students by means of over testing and under teaching has caused Massachusetts educators to take a stand against the governmental requirements within the schooling system.

On Monday teachers were seen sporting “less testing, more learning” stickers to show their support for the educational movement that will benefit the students of Massachusetts. Although most teachers seemed proud and excited to wear the stickers, another simply claimed that, “the union told me to wear the sticker, so I did.” It seems as though some are blindly supporting a good cause, but are still helping to make change. Conversely, other teachers spoke of the importance of their students actually learning and not just memorizing for upcoming assessments, then simply forgetting everything they learned. Educators care about their students and know the immense role assessments have in a student’s life, something that has been etched into student’s minds over the years, so many tend to teach toward the test instead of teaching what is truly important. In the end, the students are not taught how many teachers believe they should be.

The clear enthusiasm and loyalty to the cause within many teachers’ classrooms adds to the possibility of change occurring in the coming years. Although many teachers support the movement out of belief in the importance of learning, others have seen the detrimental impact testing holds on some students. One teacher spoke of a student in the fourth grade. The 9 year old child suffered with extreme stress because of ultimately irrelevant assessments. The student learned the immense importance placed on earning a high score at such a young age which shaped his own self worth.

The real question is deciding if the extreme stress caused by any test is worth the grade received, whether it is good or bad.