Everybody is a Genius.

Dear Next President, Standardized testing is placed too high on the flagpole of importance. Albert Einstein presented the statement, "Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing it is stupid." This quote is very meaningful to every single generation that has ever been and every one ever to be. A great Greek philosopher, Plato, had an idea, which he had written about in his piece, "The Republic". He describes his ideal system of education. In this piece Plato speaks of how it is a waste of time trying to get everyone to the exact same intellectual level when it is clearly impossible. He thinks it is best for people to learn and excel in what they are good at instead of continually teaching the same things to all the people when it does not work. For instance, there are five students all with different characteristics, one is very good with science and math, one is a hunter, one is good at building, one is highly philosophical, and the last is an athlete. The science and math student and the philosophy student would continue to learn past, say 8th grade, where as, the other three students would continue learning and getting better at what they were good at. This can be achieved, no one needs to learn everything. Along with standardized testing comes the thought process of "I'm stupid," which can lead to a downward spiral. This thought process causes some students to think that they are stupid so why even try, which causes them to fall even harder. These tests should only be used for students looking to go further with their education, because if there is no interest, there is no success.