Callie: Hey y’all. Welcome to Fast Facts for Gen Z. I’m your host, Callie, and I don’t know anything about anything. Come with me on my exploration of the world, and I’ll tell you everything you ever, and never, wanted to know, through the eyes of Gen Z.
Today’s episode is somewhat of a continuation of Episode 10: AP classes and why College Board is my Sworn Nemesis, and is also related to Episode 30: The Gifted Kid Mindset and Educational Trauma. Today though, I’m joined by my friend Halle Boroski. Hey Halle.
Halle: Hello.
C: Can you introduce yourself?
H: Sure! Hi guys, my name is Halle Boroski. Like Callie said, I’m her friend. I’ve known Callie since kindergarten and now we are seniors, so a long time.
C: So, today we’re mostly planning on talking about testing and the ways that schools judge intelligence and learning, and because I know that at least one of my teachers is listening to this, I want to put out a quick disclaimer that this is a problem of the system and we don’t blame individuals for it, but there are things individuals can do that make the problem better. And we’ll get there. Halle I’m not sure if you know this, but a significant chunk of my audience has not been in school for quite some time, so I was wondering if you’d describe what testing is like these days.
H: So I guess in terms of classroom-based testing, I’d say we take them pretty often. In most of my classes it tends to be… maybe one test per week or every two weeks. It does have a pretty significant weight on grade, it depends on what class you’re in and how your teacher weights it, but it is a pretty significant amount of where your grade is coming from, is the test. And then at the end of the course, you usually have an exam and an exam is worth twenty percent of your entire grade. Those are some pretty significant chunks of your grade so most- of most of what you’re getting as a reflection of your time in class is a test grade. When you’re looking forward to applying to college you do have to take a big, almost summative test, and those are known as the SAT or ACT. And then if you’re going into the workforce, you have individual tests for that, and those are also very big indicators for colleges of, like, where your intelligence level lies, almost? So those are the ACT and SAT.
C: You and I have both survived many years of schooling and I have done it being pretty comfortable with this format of test-taking. I know a lot of people can’t say the same. I mean, it requires you to focus in silence for very long amounts of time, sometimes four, five, six hours straight with silent breaks only to stand to get water every hour or so. For people still learning English, it’s always a toss up whether a test will have a version in their first language, or whether there will be a translator available. Halle, does this format of testing work for you the way it does for me, or have you had a different experience?
H: I’ve definitely had a different experience. I actually have an eye condition called anisocoria, so one of my pupils lets in more light than the other, and because I didn’t know that I had this condition until around second grade, I actually missed all the foundations of learning English and how to read. So I actually wasn’t fluent in reading until fifth grade. And, so, that was a really big deal for testing.
C: Yeah I mean like how are you supposed to-
H: Right.
C: -read a test if you can’t read.
H: Yeah, so I was- I was really good at the math portion because I could look at the numbers!
C: (laughs)
H: No, like, word problems? Couldn’t do those. I had a really hard time trying to read the passages. I definitely have a different experience in terms of test-taking, especially foundational tests, like the end-of-grade tests. Used to do pretty poorly on those.
C: That’s like three straight hours of just reading.
H: Exactly.
C: And if your eyes cannot perceive the words…
H: Oh gosh, it was terrible. I mean, I just like, looking around like “how does everybody know what they’re doing, I don’t know what’s going on.”
C: You couldn’t see it!
H: Right! So because of that, I have- I had special accommodations to like, you know, I’d go sit in a separate room. And then, like, I guess for a couple tests, now that I think about it, in like elementary school, I was permitted a reader for math tests if they had reading questions, because they were like, “Oh, that’s not- that’s not a fair test of her math skills then, that’s like reading.” I definitely have had, like, a love-hate relationship with tests. I’m not a very good test taker as it is. And then after I learned how to read, I’m just a slow reader. So that’s definitely been a weird experience for me. And then like going into middle school, I didn’t want those special accommodations because it made me feel weird – not that I have anything against, like, going into another room or stuff – I don’t know, I just felt like I had an unfair advantage to the test.
C: Yeah.
H: Which I know isn’t true.
C: Yeah I- yeah I understand where you’re coming from. I feel like if I were in that position, I would feel somewhat singled-out. But also that, like, if you don’t know what it’s like to not need those accommodations, you might not perceive yourself as not… needing them… if that makes sense. If you’re like, “no no, this is fine and this is- and I’m- this is how everybody feels it, so why do I get this when this is completely normal.”
H: Right, no that’s definitely- like after I learned to read, I was like, “alright, well I’m done with that.”
C: “I guess if I can read now and everything’s normal and fine.”
H: Right, right.
C: Were those accommodations helpful to you?
H: Definitely in the beginning. Like, I remember in elementary school being really grateful for the people who were able to sit in a room with me, because I used to have really bad anxiety as well, so I’d freak out a little bit every time we had a test because “Oh, I can’t read!”
C: Well, I mean, that is kind of warranted anxiety, I would say.
H: Right. So those were good accommodations to have and I’m very appreciative of them because I think that’s why I started to get the hang of things going into middle school. And then, like I said, after probably sixth grade I stopped having accommodations – because of my own well, they asked me if I wanted them and I said no. I wouldn’t- I wouldn’t say ashamed… I was just like, “oh gosh, everybody can read, all my friends can read.” Because, you know, you- you’ve always been smart, all of our friends have been smart.
C: Yeah, that’s true, we have had a pretty intelligent friend group.
H: Yeah. I guess I just kept it to myself. I honestly didn’t think about it much until starting to apply to colleges and talking about my grades in interviews and… yeah.
C: Yeah. I remember when I took the SAT in seventh grade – and it was for some academic program I didn’t end up doing – and I was miserable the entire time, right? We were twelve?
H: Yeah, I took it too!
C: Yeah. I couldn’t advocate for myself like this then, but I’ll say it now: very few twelve year olds can sit completely silent and still through five straight hours of a testament for people four grade levels above. Even if they’ve been labeled as gifted by the school, which is why we were taking this test. I didn’t have access to a graphing calculator, Halle, I couldn’t have done some of the problems if I knew how.
H: No, I had to ask before I took it, you know, obviously high school math has a lot of functions, I was like “what does the F mean?” And my teacher was like, “Oh boy. Good luck.”
C: Oh boy!
H: So no, I totally feel you. And I definitely had a huge issue trying to stay still. I mean, it was really hard. I was just sitting there, almost hopeless, I was like, “Well I don’t know how to do any of this, so that’s cool.”
C: Yeah! Did you take the SAT in high school?
H: I was more an ACT person so I took the ACT twice and I’ve taken a SAT once and the PSAT once.
C: I took- I was going to take the SAT but then pandemic, so I didn’t take the SAT. If you could look back on your SAT experience in high school and in seventh grade, how was that different? Or the same.
H: Okay… well, yeah, there’s a little bit of both. In terms of difference, I definitely felt more matured. To be able to sit still and like, not freak out. Just like, “Okay Halle, you can do this, do your best, if you don’t know the question just either move on or put an answer that you think is a 50/50 shot.” And then I also felt more prepared content-wise. Like it was stuff that I’ve seen throughout all of my high school experience like it wasn’t- like when I was in seventh grade and had never seen a function before.
C: Right.
H: Right, so I felt more confident. I guess I kind of was in the same boat of like, I don’t really want to take this test, but I was asked to take this test, there’s no option to not take it in my- in my experience. I was like, “Alright, well, I guess I’m just gonna take it and try my best at it.” But I wasn’t really holding out for anything, I guess.
C: Yeah yeah the point of this topic isn’t to be, like, “Don’t give the SAT to children!!!” Like that… that’s unusual, like, people don’t give the SAT to children. This is an unusual thing. But the point is that, like… it feels… useless.
H: Oh. I agree. I never did anything with that score.
C: Everyone in the school had to take the ACT. Like, we all did it at once, we all did it together, it was a whole day. We had to do it. And so taking the SAT… feels a little useless. Some people are better at the SAT than the ACT but, like… why do you think that is? Maybe because tests are… dumb.
H: I can’t read, so that’s why I’m better at the ACT. (both laugh)
C: Heard you talk about removing the SAT altogether?
H: I actually have! A lot of it comes from my mom, obviously, she’s a college recruiter and admissions officer, so I do hear pretty often about changes that they’re making to that, or to Common App, or just College Board in general. It’s minimal, but I have heard a minimal talk of removing the SAT, because the ACT covers most of the same stuff with the addition of the topic of science. A lot of people have moved away from it. I guess we’ll see what happens with that in the future. In terms of testing in general, I’d like to say that they’re starting to move away from weight on testing, but I honestly don’t think that that is 100% true for everybody.
C: Mhm. Do you have an opinion on whether or not they should remove the SAT?
H: I mean, for sure for, like, middle schoolers. Like that was such a terrible, traumatizing thing, like “I can’t go to high school I don’t know how to do this!”
C: Well, yeah yeah yeah, that was a special situation.
H: Yeah, but in terms of removing it from high school curriculum and stuff like that, like teaching to do well on the SAT, I guess I- I would agree that I feel like two tests are unnecessary. I think for some people the option is- is nice if they’re especially, like, adverse to science and they really don’t want to take that. But, I mean, I personally believe that testing is not a good way of showing someone’s intelligence level or what sort of curriculum they’ve been learning because, obviously coming from somebody like me who couldn’t read, I was a smart kid, like I- I moved up grades and stuff, but my test scores never reflected that.
C: Yeah. Yeah, I mean I- I’ve had varying experiences with, like, grades and stuff. I’ve never been one to- I’ve never been one to have test anxiety or be worried about a grade that was lower than I wanted. And I attribute that to my parents, mostly, that they didn’t freak out about that and so I didn’t freak out about that. But I also have seen that in classes where I feel like I’m doing super well and I understand great, I’ll get a garbage grade on a test, and I’m like “I don’t… okay… why?”
H: Yeah.
C: It doesn’t reflect how much I’m actually understanding of this course and how much I am engaging with this course. And then there will be classes that I- in which I am really struggling and it doesn’t engage me at all, and then I’ll take a test and I’ll get like a hundred and I’ll be like “wh- how.”
H: Yes! I feel you. My classes seem the exact same. I’ll be taking a test for one of my classes that I don’t necessarily have affinity for, like, I’m not a big- I don’t have a big interest in it, and then I’m like fine on the test. But then in the classes that I really work hard for, I think “why is this test like this? This is not reflective of all the work that I put in.”
C: Yeah, definitely it’s not reflective of work. It’s not an accurate reflection of how much a student understands and like I think teachers in classrooms use it to judge, like, how much the student understood of the unit or, like, how well the teacher taught it. Especially in AP classes, because of how fast we have to move, oftentimes we’ll take a test and then move on to the next unit the very next day and we won’t have time to reflect. So the teacher will get the test scores and be like, “Aha, yes, this student who got a 66 on this test,” *cough cough* me, “clearly did not understand this unit. Oh well. Moving on to the next one, I guess.”
H: Right.
C: There’s just nothing… you take it, you get a number, it goes off into the void, you never see it again, you…
H: Right.
C: The students don’t get anything out of it. This- the teachers may understand, “Man, I will have to make this better for next year.” But that doesn’t help the right now. And your student has a failing grade in the class.
H: Right, no, I totally understand what you’re saying and I think it’s hard because you want to have an equal… like an equal way for everybody to show what they know, and so I guess the easiest way to do that is taking a test because it’s the same for every single person. But again, I agree that it’s subjective and that there needs… I get that, like teachers are on the struggle bus trying to get all the content in by an exam which, again, exams are just a test.
C: AP teachers are on a different…are- are struggling with slightly different parameters than other teachers. Teachers who design their own curriculums do get a little bit more freedom than teachers who have to kneel at the feet of College Board.
H: Right, so I had to think about it, but I am 100% agreed that in the majority of my classes, you take a test and get your grade, you move on. There’s no discussion of, like, how you could have done better, what happened here?
C: And not even how you could’ve done better, what aren’t, like, what do you do you not understand about the unit?
H: Right.
C: What can I do to help you learn more of this?
H: Right! And maybe, like, a way to combat that: I know some of my classes we do, like, after-unit polls and I do find that helpful, where I can anonymously chat my teacher and be like, “okay so clearly on the test, this portion didn’t go well for me and I think this is why. This is what I would like to go over moving on or before the exam.” Or something like that.
C: Yeah and oftentimes what I’ll run into in tests is that I know the content, but I just got confused. It’s not that I don’t understand it in my brain, it’s just that I got it wrong.
H: No, I, that’s like my whole life, you don’t even know.
C: And it’s really hard to describe… I found that it’s very difficult to describe to my parents because, I mean obviously they grew up in this testing environment too, but their perception is, like, “Well how else am I supposed to know what you understand? I don’t understand. You got it wrong, that means you don’t understand it.” And I’m like, “well, that’s not necessarily the whole story.”
H: Yeah, no I’m totally with you, especially coming from my parents. They’re both also extremely smart. It is- I- it’s very hard to describe to them, like, “listen, I knew what I was doing, I wrote down the wrong number. I knew what I was doing, I just… when I read it I hadn’t seen anything like it before and that threw me off and I did the wrong formula.” Or something like that, so-
C: And of course there’s that- there’s the angle of, “Well if you are worried about getting confused, why don’t you just check over your work?” And I’m like, well what’s stopping from getting confused twice? – A. B – it comes back to the true test of attention and focus that test taking is. I have been known to rush through tests because I cannot sit there and look at it for longer than like half an hour at a time. So I gotta ZOOM. I got to get the answers in before I- my brain just disappears into nothingness.
H: Yeah.
C: Sometimes I knocked it out. Sometimes I just left a wake of confusion and wrong answers behind me.
H: Yeah. I guess I have a different perspective on that because my brain works a different way. Like I sit down and I’m like, “okay Halle, you’re taking this test. This is what’s going to happen. If you don’t know a question, you move on, you come back.” So I- usually I- and again I’m a slow reader, so I usually spend a significant amount of the time given on taking the test, and that being said, there’s not a lot of time for me to go back. Because I spent a lot of time on each question, like “okay do I really know what I’m doing? Do I not know what I’m doing?” I don’t know if that’s necessarily the best for my mental health taking tests because I’ve put my whole soul into this test and if I get back a bad grade, that- that’s not- my brain is just like okay like you really put everything you know into it so like if you can back a raw score that’s not great, like that just reflects what you know.
C: Yeah, and that’s something I’m- what I’m noticing in listening to both of us is that we approach and experience testing in very different ways, and both are decidedly unpleasant.
H: Yeah, for sure.
C: Neither of them work. Neither of them are good. We- we don’t like them. And something I’ve been struggling with recently with this debate running around in my head is that, like I worry about being perceived like I’m making excuses.
H: Yeah.
C: Like, (mockingly) “Oh, I just did bad on the test because I can’t go back and check my work, I don’t have the attention span, I just can’t do it, I just can’t- I just can’t do it.” Something I have been working on with myself is breaking down that- that mindset. Something I have written on a sticky note on my desk is “Making choices that make your life easier does not make you lazy.” Like it’s not selfish or lazy to want your life to be better.
H: Yeah that’s definitely… I mean, that speaks mountains. That’s something that I need to take into consideration because where I- I feel you. Like a test is not going to make or break your whole life, like, make it easier, work- work smarter not harder for sure. I’m so burnt out from just expending my whole energy into every single test that I take and then just getting that bad grade and feeling like “oh my gosh I really don’t understand what I’m doing.” It’s just so disheartening. And then my parents are confused as to why when I spent so long studying. So I definitely agree with you that you’re not being lazy, you’re taking pity on your- I mean not pity but, you’re having mercy on yourself.
C: You’re trying to survive.
H: Right. There’s not anything else you can do. That’s just the nature of taking a test.
C: Right. And it’s- this conversation sounds so dramatic but it… I feel like it’s worth the drama. Everybody hates taking tests.
H: Right.
C: And I feel like it isn’t bad to be like, “Huh. This feels like it’s not working.”
H: Right.
C: “And I think it should be better than this.”
H: Right. And to a student in this day and age, I mean, testing is essentially our whole lives because-
C: I feel like I have a test like every two days.
H: What your grades are are how you get into college. And your grades are reflective of all your tests.
C: And hardly anything else.
H: It is very difficult to be able to look at somebody’s application without a test score just because it’s equal for everybody, but-
C: But it’s not. Something we’re starting to learn is that even the test scores are not… like “standardized” is a strong word.
H: Right. Because you’re given the same questions, but nobody’s given the same education. How do you know that this person has been taught this? Some people do, you know, their own studying or yes, they have a tutor. I agree that it’s very difficult.
C: Equal but not equitably.
H: Yeah, so it’s- it’s very difficult to figure out how to gauge that. And especially reviewing from a college admission standpoint, I’ve been talking to my mom about it pretty recently, obviously since I’m applying to colleges, and I didn’t submit any of my test scores. Because I wasn’t proud enough of them and I didn’t- I wasn’t able to retake because of COVID so they- they weren’t bad, it was just like… I guess maybe societal or parent pressure. Yeah, so I definitely agree that, like, based on what opportunities are available to you, you’re definitely going to- I mean even if it says it’s equal, it’s definitely not. It’s… so I agree that we need to move away from maybe test scores and into more, like… somebody could spend all their time studying or doing extracurriculars while another person who’s more disadvantaged is taking time to care for their family. Like that is something that is extraordinarily important to be reflected on an application. Or just as an individual. like we shouldn’t be judging people based on test scores. Like they got a blank on the SAT,. they must be smart. It needs to be more experience over grades.
C: Yeah, I hear people asking, like, “well, if we take away test scores then how are colleges supposed to tell who’s smart?” And I’m like, “well… I feel like we need to move away from all of that.” I feel like we need to just completely overhaul how colleges admit students.
H: Yeah.
C: We need to completely overhaul how the colleges judge students, how high schools build up foundational skills, how kids are told to perceive themselves, like it it just all needs to go away. We need something new.
H: No, I agree
C: We cannot fix one problem because every other problem is connected to it. We have to fix them all.
H: And like realistically I know we can’t just be like, “Okay! No more test scores!” Or, like, “This is not how we’re doing college anymore!” But I think that a stepping stone for that is like-
C: Imagine if we could, though. Oh my god…
H: Oh my gosh, life would be amazing.
C: I’m gonna found a college and just be like, “Anybody! Anybody you want! It’s free!”
H: I think if students could rank what they find most important about themselves, in terms of what they’re submitting to college, I think that would be such a better indication of like what does a student value, what do they believe about themselves?
C: Oh my god that’s genius. I have to write that down.
H: If I were like, oh shoot, I know my extracurriculars are good and I know that I spend all my time working on this, and- and I just don’t think that my test scores are as reflective of who I am as a person and how intelligent I am, I could say, “Great! Look at my extracurriculars first, then my essay, then my letters of recommendation, THEN look at my test scores. So that you get a sense of who I am as a person. For now, I think that that would be such a better way to evaluate somebody’s application.
C: Here is another question for you, and I’m pretty sure I know what you’re gonna say. How much impact do you think that parent pressure has on a student’s performance at school and how they feel about that performance?
H: So I’m gonna start with a disclaimer that I love my parents and they’re very-
C: Oh, yeah!
H: Very supportive of everything that I do. I don’t know if pressure is necessarily the word… they understand if I do poorly on a test or if I don’t like a class, I mean, they understand I’m human and I can’t be good at everything. In terms of pressure… I don’t know if I felt that I need to get a specific score, I think it’s always been a support in the form of, like, “Oh, well, you want to go to this school so make sure that you’re keeping up your grades and taking your tests seriously because we want you to be successful.” But the only way for you to do that in this day and age is to be doing this. So as a result of that, I think there’s been a lot of me lacking having, like, a social life. I spent a lot of my time studying and doing work. The parental pressure’s just like, “We know you’re smart, so why aren’t you reflecting that.” And then it’s like, “We want you to do well in life, we want you to go where you want to go, so we’re going to be pushing you to hit that limit for yourself because that’s what you want.”
C: Yeah, another thing I’ve been thinking about recently is how we evaluate success and how we evaluate, like, what matters, because apparently to be Successful you have to be – Successful with a capital S – you have to be good at school and to go to a Good – capital G – Good college and get a Good job so that you can have a Good life… I just… what does that even mean?
H: Yeah, yeah.
C: None of that has anything to do with how you feel.
H: Right.
C: I think a lot of the communication between schools and parents is about how to prepare your kid for the future: how to make the best child, how to keep your kid on the path that you want them to be on. From my perspective, that approach to communication is a huge problem. I think that the approach needs to be much more focused on, like, encouraging students to find their own paths, to learn as much as they can, and-
H: And what they’re interested in.
C: And what they’re interested in! That’s- that’s a huge one. And helping schools and parents and students all work together to help the kid make it through the school system with an at least mostly intact mental health. I think about this problem a lot too, but I- I’ve found myself talking about it like this already, but high school isn’t a stepping stone to college, you know?
H: Yeah.
C: Like it’s not a step to technical school or the work force either, and college isn’t a stepping stone to a Good Enough job or a Successful future. It’s its own thing. I feel like a lot of teenagers, especially the ones who feel, like, a lot of pressure to get into the best college, to get the best job, I think they feel like they’ve missed out on a lot of high school. They’ve missed out on joining clubs for fun- can you imagine joining a club for fun?
H: (laughs) Um… okay, well, I’ll talk about that in a second, keep going.
C: Okay. (laughs) They’ve missed joining clubs for fun, hanging out with friends without stressing that they’re not spending enough time working, or like they’ve missed out on trying a new class that they might be interested in because they’ve had their academic pathway laid out in a Google Doc in seventh grade.
H: Yeah.
C: Me.
H: (laughs) Me too.
C: I know! It’s a nightmare. I got into a horticulture class this semester, it’s totally different from anything I’ve ever done and it’s incredible.
H: Oh gosh. Bless you. I’m so jealous.
C: I know. What do you- what do you think about this? This… is high school a stepping stone to college?
H: No, I was a student that you’re literally describing, feeling like they’re missing out on high school. I can definitely say that, at first, going into high school, I was like “Yes, this is where I’m gonna figure out what I want to do in college.” And going into college now… girl, I have no idea what I want to do. I’m just like, “Oh, science is cool.”
C: Did you have any time to figure it out?
H: No! I mean, and that wasn’t even a conversation had! It was basically, on your summer break, you’re just supposed to like… alright, well, you go back to school and you know what you want to do. Like, what?? So as somebody who’s also had their schedule laid out, and you know we’re both on the AP track-
C: (mumbling) God I hate that…
H: I- I do feel that I’ve missed out a lot of the high school experience. And to combat that, I mean, I’ve missed out on so much sleep and mental health.
C: Oh my god.
H: Girl, I’m in what, fifteen clubs?
C: Wait, what?
H: Yeah! It was, like, thirteen or fifteen junior year. Obviously I can’t do them all at home because we’re not having some, but it’s because I- it was like, like, Halle you can’t- you can’t miss out on high school just because you want to get into a good college! So I did clubs that I thought I would like and that I was interested in with clubs that I was like, “Oh like this is probably good for college.” So I just ended up, instead of sacrificing, I ended up doing it all.
C: You thought, “I guess I’ll just be in all the clubs. That’s fine.”
H: And, I mean, that that was such a bad decision. I love all the clubs I’m in. Junior year, I averaged, like, four hours of sleep a night at most. Sometimes it was all nighter.
C: Halle, that’s so miserable.
H: Oh, I know! And then sports on top of that, I mean, sports every season. It was a nightmare. And it was just me trying to think I had to- “Yeah, this is preparing me for college!” And now that I’m looking at applying to schools, looking into the programs I want to do, no it’s not! What? There is nothing, nothing I’ve learned like- yes, I like community service, and like yes, I like science.
C: A teacher asked me the other day if I felt like high school had gone by fast… he didn’t mean it in a philosophical way, we were just kind of- we were just bantering and he just kind of threw it out there. I think that it has, but not in like a “time flies when you’re having fun” kind of way.
H: Yeah yeah.
C: I think a lot of seniors right now are looking back on their high school careers and wondering where the time went but like… not because it was good, but because they spent all four years with their noses to the ground.
H: Yeah.
C: We never took a moment to stop and be teenagers. And it doesn’t really help that the media is full of, like, teen dramas and romances and adventures that, first of all, are unrealistic anyway, but also represent a lot of things that we flew by in search of a perfect SAT score.
H: You just described my whole life. People ask me that question so often. I mean, it’s hard to answer because when I’m in school, my mindset is, “You’re doing this day to make it to the next day.” And then I kept doing that. And then when I’m on weekend, “This is my time to catch up.” So I’m not even getting a weekend, it’s just prolonged school, just with no class. And then it’s just that mindset, and then when you get to summer, there’s a summer project, gotta start that, so you’re just in school all the time. And so it’s almost like you don’t even know the time is flying because that’s your everyday for years, and then once you’re getting close to where that’s not your everyday, you’re looking for what happened.
C: Yeah, and a lot of the like- the like- self care media around is like, “Live in the moment!” And then everything else is like, “NO.”
H: Once a month I’ll do a face mask and be like, “Wow! You deserve this.”
C: Self care!
H: You’re doing this for yourself! Meanwhile I’m doing homework while I’m like sitting with my face mask on.
C: (laughs) Literally doing- doing homework with your face mask on. “Yes, this is self care, this is taking time for myself, I am rejuvenating.”
H: Exactly. I’ll watch a TV show and be like, “Wow! This is so scandalous!”
C: “Wow, I- I’m such a rebel! I watched one episode of a TV show.” Amazing.
H: And I- I can’t just sit still anymore. I’m like writing my college essays while I’m watching stuff, like “Woo! Break time!”
C: Yeah I- I’m gonna tease a future episode because a teacher inspired me to write it, but I feel like a lot of that go-go-go energy comes from feeling guilty when you’re not working.
H: Yes, that’s like my whole life.
C: I like, finished my homework at three o’clock and I don’t have a fourth period and I was like, “…what am I supposed to do?”
H: Yeah.
C: “I have nothing…to do.”
H: You just gave me a whole, like, spiritual awakening. That’s like, actually unbelievable.
C: I was really worried about it too! I was like, “No! I have to write something! I have to write a podcast! I have to work!”
H: That’s eye-opening because every single second of my day is filled with something. And I mean, I don’t even sleep enough because I’m always like, “Oh, the guilt!” Like I- I have to do something. It’s just: get up, start doing your homework, go to class, during lunch you’re doing homework, then you’re done with school, doing homework, then I’m tutoring, then I’m doing homework, and then I’m like going to bed, and then like it starts again. And it’s just… because I, like truly cannot fill time- I mean I- I need to have everything filled. I just… I feel you. It’s almost like a fear of really sitting and thinking.
C: It probably doesn’t help that one and a quarter of our high school years were spent in a pandemic.
H: Definitely doesn’t help. (both laugh) I had that crisis last year when we got out of school. For two weeks, I didn’t do any school work, and I was like, “What? Am I even a student?”
C: Terror. Oh my god.
H: Yeah.
C: “My life is ruined. I’ll never get into college at this rate.”
H: Sobbed for about four hours.
C: I believe that too and that makes it worse. (both laugh) So obviously we talked about a lot of problems so far, so I wanted to make some more time to brainstorm solutions. In the long term I’m hoping for a cultural shift, obviously, but that can’t happen without the actions of individuals. So, what are some things that teachers can do or things that you’ve seen teachers do that can help?
H: There’s definitely so many solutions out there. It’s hard for me to know because I’m from the student perspective, not a teacher, but from what I’ve seen and what I would like to see is just less… well, I mean, less pressure on a test, possibly not as many. I know that this is all very hard to format into a curriculum, especially if you’re run by College Board.
But, in particular, in one of my classes that I really enjoy, the teacher gives very minimal tests, and when we have them, there’s no rule on retakes or what- what you can do to improve your grade because they… all teachers say “I care about you,” and I’m like, “Well, if you care about me, then you care about my grade.” Because really and truly, that’s what I’m working for high school. As much as I hate to admit that, like I wish it weren’t that way, that is what I care about in this moment, so if you care about me, you care about my grade. And I’m going to put in the work to figure out what I did wrong, but I don’t think that like my grade needs to be penalized on it because then it’s like, I feel like a bad person. I feel like I- I didn’t spend enough time, I mean, I study for tests for like six hours and if I do bad, I’m like, “I could have done more. and I could have done-”
C: “I could’ve studied for seven hours!”
H: Right! Like it’s just such a perpetual circle of okay, study, do bad, cry about it, try to do better. And it- it just can’t be that way. So I think the teachers really need to understand that students aren’t doing bad because they want to do bad. They’re trying. If they’re willing to put in the extra time to try harder to understand what they did wrong or to make amends for that, like I think that that needs to be acceptable. For test grades… like I just… I think weighting, because teachers can pick their weighting, I don’t think tests need to be weighted as much. Also, like, why spend your time preparing us for tests that like, if we pass or fail it doesn’t have a huge impact on our future. Spend the time teaching the content that you think we’ll find interesting, or that is important for our future to know. That would be one solution.
C: One of the questions that I hear a lot in my, like, preparation for tests, is, “What’s going to be on this?” Or like, you ask me every week, “Was the test more like the quiz or more like the- the- the- the AP classroom or more like the homework?”
H: Yeah.
C: Because we aren’t worried about whether we learned the content or not, we’re worried about the specific details of this test, how this test is going to work, and how we can beat the test at its own game. One of my teachers has approached this in a- in a different way and I’m not- he hasn’t explained why, but I should ask him – he just doesn’t give tests. And he gives everybody a 100 on every single assignment.
H: Wow.
C: Provided they turn it in.
H: Okay, I have a similar experience with one of my teachers currently. Not like a straight 100, but we also don’t have tests, and let me just say, it has saved my mental health. However, I will say… do I pay attention as much? No. And that may be because of the- the subject matter isn’t my preference, like I’m not very interested in the topic. It is hard to know that like- what makes it so that students are paying attention? Because right now, I’m like, “oh my god, this can be on the test, I need to study this, prepare this, this needs to be ingrained in my memory.” Which, like, is that healthy? No. Will I ever need it again? No! So I think there’s a fine line between testing making people feel as though they need to make sure they understand the information, and- and then taking that to a level too far.
C: Well I think that- that I’ve also seen that problem that you are describing with people feeling that they don’t have to pay attention in a class where they’re not working on a test, and I think that is not something that is permanent. I think that we have been told that if something isn’t on the test, it doesn’t matter, and so if there aren’t tests for class, the class doesn’t matter. And if that… can be… not that-
H: Right.
C: Then it isn’t gonna be a problem.
H: I mean, that comes down to – are you taking the classes you like? Because in the one class I don’t have tests in, that is a required class, there’s no way I could have gotten out of it, and it’s not my affinity, I don’t really enjoy the topic, I’m not going to like to spend my time on that, but in the class that I spoke about earlier that has minimal tests but like provides retakes and stuff, I don’t worry. I mean, I don’t think about the test until the night before, and even then I don’t really study for it, which is so surprising to me because I’m such a, like, a worrywort, like “ohh gotta do everything to prepare.” But it’s truly just because I find the information so interesting, like it’s something that I am considering pursuing in the future, like, I just enjoy that content. So I’m not thinking about, “Oh gosh this is gonna be on the test, better study it,” I’m like, “Whoa, that’s so interesting.”
C: It’s so clear to me how much I’ve been affected by this because when you said, “I don’t think about the test until the night before and even then I don’t even study,” I got scared. I was like, “what?? What???”
H: What????
C: “What- do you- but don’t you care about this class?????”
H: Yeah.
C: And the answer is yes and that’s why.
H: You know what’s crazy? I am- I’ve always been, you know, I just told you, I study for six hours for every test. What’s crazy is I don’t I- I mean, I study, obviously, I’d like make study guides, but I’m not like- I don’t spend six hours studying for these tests. And I do well. And the reason is because I’m so interested in the material in class, it’s just there. I mean, it’s just in my brain. I’ve absorbed it because I think it’s interesting and-
C: And you’re not worried about it.
H: Right, it’s almost like, whatever happens happens. I’m pretty sure I know it because I like this class.
C: Right and it’s- it’s a mental thing like you don’t- it’s almost like you don’t have to take a test in order to understand the material.
H: Right.
C: Almost. (sarcastically) I don’t know, that seems like kind of a radical idea to me. But my teacher who doesn’t give tests – he seems to be able to judge whether or not we’re learning just fine. I mean, we have like, written assignments and stuff. We read a lot in that class and we respond to it in writing, and at least in my experience, he reads them all and gives very detailed, or at least a little bit of comments on- on the assignment, and he uses that to gauge how much we’re paying attention, how much we value the class, what we all want out of the class. He seems to be doing just fine without testing us on the material.
H: Yeah.
C: And everybody’s grade is doing great. Because he also takes late work.
H: Love that.
C: I love this man so much, he’s making my life so much easier, and I’m also learning more from this class than I have ever learned in any class ever in my whole life.
H: Dang, this is like, incredible.
C: I know.
H: Gosh. I’m jealous. Wish it were me. No, I- this is so hard because this is coming from two, you know, straight-A, like AP students.
C: I know, I’m having a lot of cognitive dissonance in this conversation.
H: Yeah, because I- I just getting back to people who need that test score or like, they just don’t pay attention and are good test takers. And so is- is what we’re talking about, like no tests and they can just tell, is that really fair and understandable to everybody? It’s very- it’s a very difficult conversation to like, think about every single side of the story, and then again if you have a learning disability, like testing isn’t fair to you.
C: It just goes to show how you can’t have a one size fits all format of education.
H: Yes.
C: Because one size does not fit all and standardized testing is… for lack of a better word, bad, there isn’t a- there isn’t one thing you can do to replace it. It doesn’t- in my opinion, it doesn’t need replacement. If those students who are surviving school because they can get through a class without having to pay much attention… that’s a survival tactic, and they’re doing it for a reason. If they were actually interested in the material and it was presented in an engaging way without putting pressure on the test as the only thing that matters, maybe those students would figure out that something else matters other than the test, and they were able to- they would be able to engage with content that they enjoy without being like, “Oh, well, the test is the only thing that matters, so, and I can do fine on that, so I’ll just phone it in because nothing else about this matters.”
H: Right.
C: You know, it’s bad for everybody, even the people who are really good test-takers. Like, I can phone it in for 30, 35% of the time and do just fine, and in those classes, sometimes I’m like, “Well, it doesn’t really matter, I’ll be fine on the test whether I can- whether I pay attention today or not.” If I didn’t think all that matters is that I do fine on the test, maybe I will find other value in those classes
H: I truly don’t think that they’re a good representation of course material or anything like that.
C: Mmhm, yeah, and the fact that I can point my fingers at every near-failing test grade I’ve ever had and tell you exactly what was going on with me that day-
H: Yep.
C: Just goes to show that it’s like- a grade does not reflect how much I understood. Like this 66 on his math test – I had a pretty rough panic attack thirty seconds after I hit start on the test, but it’s timed, so I had to take it.
H: Right! The tests definitely… they do show more your mental, physical state and also like, people do better on the ACT if they have a tutor because they figured out the tactics and like, this not even testing intelligence then, that’s testing, “have you done practice questions?” Because they’re all the same. So it’s like, I guess, tests are so… like they’re not even testing intelligence at that point, because I agree I can point to every single bad test grade and be, “Oh, I didn’t sleep for two days before I took this test, and I just had to take it because I- I mean there’s no way around that.”
C: It’s hard for my brain because that sounds like an excuse.
H: Yes! And then when I tell my parents that, I’m like, “Oh my gosh, no it’s me, I’m sorry I did bad on this test because I just don’t know what I’m doing.”
C: Right, and it’s- it sounds like an excuse for a personal failure, and a bad test grade is not a personal failure, and that is something I’m having a really hard time internalizing.
H: I definitely can’t internalize that.
C: Right, but a bad test grade is not a personal failure, and the reason that you got a bad test grade, even if that reason is, “I didn’t study enough,”
H: Yeah.
C: It’s fine.
H: Yeah.
C: You’re- you’re good. You don’t have to beat yourself up. You don’t have to think, “Oh I should have done better.”
H: That’s such a difficult leap to make.
C: A test is just a stupid number, it doesn’t mean anything, it has no reflection on you at all.
H: I mean in the grand scheme of things it doesn’t even affect you or anything.
C: For real.
H: And that’s so difficult to accept, for sure, especially people who – their whole life is school, like you said, missing out on a high school experience for that. And then you- you miss out on what, like, a football game on a Friday because you’re studying for tests and you fail the test. What was all for then? It’s just an endless cycle of you’re not doing good enough but there’s no way that you can gain back anything that you’ve lost because you’re trying so hard.
I went to the planetarium the other week right before I had a test on a weekend… bro, I was like, “Well, this test is insignificant, I’m insignificant, I don’t care about anything anyway.”
C: We all need a good dose of existentialism.
H: Yup. The galaxy isn’t real, we all live in a microcosm of nothingness, my individual being isn’t gonna do anything, this test means absolutely nothing. Yeah.
C: Yeah.
H: Nothing matters.
C: And they wonder why Gen Z doesn’t care about anything. Thank you for joining me Halle. What’s next for you?
H: In terms of what is next, obviously, I’m planning on graduating high school.
C: Fingers crossed!
H: Yeah, and then going to a four-year college, I’m not sure which one yet, I still have six more to hear back from – you know, you want to talk about overdoing it, I applied to seventeen.
C: I’m going to kill you.
H: So six more to hear back from, and I’m very excited to try something new and be on my own. After that I’m probably going to continue to pursue education through a Master’s or Doctorate, we will see.
C: Is that in your little- your- your academic plan Google Doc from seventh grade?
H: Yeah, heck yeah, you know it, absolutely.
C: Elevator pitch has been there forever. “I am planning to graduate high school and attend a four year university before moving on to a graduate or doctorate degree.”
H: Indeed, in quotation marks at the bottom. “When asked, repeat this:” Basically, but that’s, I mean, that’s the long run. In the short run, I’m so ready to just enjoy my summer and relax.
C: Thank you, Halle.
H: Of course, thank you for having me!
C: Of course! Have a great day!
H: Thanks, you too.
C: Thank you for listening to Fast Facts for Gen Z. Big thanks to Halle for making time in her busy schedule to come on this week. You can find other episodes we mentioned today wherever you get your podcasts, and you can find transcripts of every episode at www.fastfactsforgenz.wordpress.com. This is Callie, signing off.
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