“I didn’t even try because I always fail.” Fail. This heartbreaking statement is from a student in a Williamsburg-James City County middle school who recently took their Virginia Standards of Learning (SOL) standardized tests. In 2024, 1 in 6 children in the U.S. experienced a mental health disorder. Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s new “Right Help, Right Now” mental health initiative is a good start, but it only addresses symptoms, not the root causes. We need to acknowledge standardized testing’s role in the youth mental health crisis within our schools.
Students from racial minority groups, students with learning disabilities and students with test-taking anxiety consistently perform below their peers. When these disadvantaged students fail the SOL year after year, it extinguishes their love of learning, some stop trying in the classroom, or their mental health spirals downward. Fail is a powerful word with lifelong, damaging effects on children.
When our children are anxious before taking the SOLs or devastated after receiving a “fail” score, it is often the mother or caregiver who picks up the pieces at home. Mothers’ voices matter, especially when it comes to children’s mental health.
A survey in the local Williamsburg Moms Facebook group received several dozen immediate responses, 40% of whom are both mothers and educators. Below are just a few comments on how the SOL impacts our children in real life.
- “He always feels defeated, regardless of score. He feels like an idiot or a failure.”
- “It made my child feel like he had to pass in order to be equal to his white classmates.”
- “My oldest was so anxious she broke out in hives every day for a week.”
- “I pulled my child from public school because of the SOLs.”
- “My son has an IEP. He is autistic. He is a very smart young man, but his knowledge is not reflected on tests.”
Numerous studies suggest that standardized testing does not fully capture a student’s intelligence, academic ability or work ethic. Although debated, standardized testing serves a purpose: It helps teachers tailor future lessons and helps school leadership identify students who need early intervention. While it’s important for educators to know the comparative scores to help inform their decisions, students don’t need a look behind the curtain to know if they failed the SOL.
A seventh grade student with learning disabilities confided in me that they “always” fail the SOL, so now they just click through the test to get it over with. After failing the SOL since third grade, they didn’t think they would ever pass the SOL. This student, like so many others, gave up hope.
We need a school testing environment where students take their SOL test, do their best and celebrate their growth from year to year. Currently, if a student improved their score from last year but still failed the SOL, there is no joy in individual progress. If students weren’t faced with the possibility of failing, would the absence of that crushing pressure allow them to put forth more effort? Would it eliminate students’ negative feelings towards themselves, school work and taking the SOL?
College admissions tests such as the SAT do not have a pass-fail line. Students try to achieve the highest score possible and are thrilled if they improve their score on a second attempt. Virginia students should view their SOL results in a similar fashion. The word “fail” needs to be removed from the testing vocabulary. Virginia children should stop internalizing that they are failures, not give up hope in the classroom, and put forth better effort on standardized tests. Caring adults need to tackle a root cause of the youth mental health crisis and remove “fail” from the SOLs. Our most vulnerable children deserve to do their best without judgment.
Monika Chess of Williamsburg is a Navy veteran, educator and mother of four students in Williamsburg-James City County schools. She is pursuing a master’s degree in secondary mathematics at William & Mary.
