woes: communities and wealthy city schools aren't the only ones experiencing testing rural sub have their own complaints. In New York, a college-oriented community. parents organized a boycott of the eighth de standardized tests. of 290 eighth-graders, only 95 showed up for the exam. In Miami protests erupted when over 12,000 Florida were high school diploma, and in Massachusetts, local school boards defied the state and issued their own diplomas students they believed were being unfairly denied their high school graduation because of the state-mandated Teachers in California and Chicago refused to giv faced disciplinary action. Why are teachers, students, and parents protesting? What's wrong with measuring academic progress through standardized tests? are some reasons why high-stake tests are problematic: chools along with students posh First, using the same tests for all students, those in well-funded ing to learn in under-funded ill equipped schools is grossly unfair, and the outcome is quite predictable. Since students do not receive equal educations, holding identical expectations for all students places the poorer ones at a disadvantage. Grade-by-grade testing and graduation tests actually increase school dropouts. A Harvard University study found that students in the bottom 10 percent of achievement were 33 percent out of school in states with graduation tests. The National Research Council found that low-performing elementary and secondary School students who are held back do less well academically, are much worse off socially, and are far likelier to drop out than equally weak students who promoted. Retention is single of which students will drop out stronger even than parental income or mother's education level. avoid the Tunderperforming