That piece doesn't even read like a good MRZINE piece, let alone the usually ponderous, pretentious MR. All those words and I still can't get a good idea what the guy actually does. Standardized tests are for the most part machine-/computer-scored. Some tests require recorded oral responses (TOEIC, TOEFL) and many require short written responses (little personal essays on an assigned topic--such as LSAT, GRE, TOEFL, new additional TOEIC 'Speaking-Writing' test, etc.). The way these are scored is three people give a holistic response to the mini-essay. If one response is an outlier, it's thrown out and the thing is scored on the avg. of two scores. Otherwise, three scores are averaged.
I think the guy means to say that institutional and standardized testing is a huge money-making business, made even larger because of the Bushturds out of Texass's drive to leave no child behind, fully phonically aware as they go to bed hungry or lack medical care or decent housing. Test-scoring is but one pathetic aspect of the industry. Pearson wants to be a big player, as do a lot of other for-profit entities moving into education. CJ -- ELT in Japan http://www.eltinjapan.com/ Japan Higher Education Outlook http://japanheo.blogspot.com/ We are Feral Cats http://wearechikineko.blogspot.com/ _______________________________________________ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
