What its like to be a bad test taker

I'm a bad test taker.

I am absolutely horrific at taking long, multiple-choice exams with no open answers. And I'm here to debunk the misconception that being a bad test taker doesn't mean you're dumb. It doesn't mean you didn't study, or pay attention or even that you don't understand the topic. It simply means just that- that you cannot be graded on explaining what you learned in the language of someone else. It needs to be written by you. 

Ever since as early as elementary school I recall myself holding my breath to see what type of quiz we'd get that day. Would it be open-ended? Or multiple-choice? The anxiety/suspense/whatever feeling it was at the age of 7-10 would build up as the teacher would announce there was a surprise quiz and begin to hand out papers. The first thing I'd do was scan the entire quiz in hopes of seeing some open ended questions. I was actually the kid who rejoiced at the sound of "please be sure your math answer demonstrate the work you did to get to the answer, and not just the answer" because at least this meant I could get half credit if I got it wrong. (and I often did) In my years, it was common to have several types of questions on every quiz, and I recall even those that were solely multiple choice, I would try to write in my reasoning on the side of the question where I could. Of course this worked fine in the classroom, but I couldn't include notes on a standardized test which used a scantron. Some teachers actually read it and provided feedback, others would get upset that I broke the template of the quiz requirement, others commended me on my creativity. "My creativity" was actually just the desperation to be heard in my own words. 

English wasn't my first language, but this isn't something I'm stating as an excuse. In fact, there was no way it could be as I was surrounded by immigrants, growing up in a public NYC school system. Some of them would do amazingly well at exams, and reading comprehension questions that I struggled so much with. I should probably throw in here that I did read. A lot. I spent afternoons at the library, or sitting on the floor of Barnes and Nobles with my best friend in middle school over the summer because I didn't want to strain my parents with 5 $30 book fees for all the summer reading we had to do. Even in 2nd and 3rd grade, when I first truly learned to speak English in its entirety, I read entire series of the Boxcar children, the Babysitters club, Goosebumps, Animorphs, all those fun kids series I couldn't get enough of. And all of their TV series sucked, so it was well worth my time!

Nonetheless, as I grew older and wiser things didn't improve with my test taking abilities. Towards the 2nd half of middle school came the dreaded day of. The specialized high school test. In NYC, this is the test that basically determines your intelligence to everyone you know. Your friends, your parents, your teachers. After the results of this test, everyone will forever know you as the kid who DID or the kid who DIDN'T get into a specialized high school. And no, Brooklyn Tech really didn't count. The order was this: Stuyvesant meant you were the smartest, Bronx Science meant you were 2nd smart, and Brooklyn Tech was 3rd and basically last place. If you didn't get into either of the 3 schools it basically meant you were can imbecile. My parents were familiar with the importance of the test and my awful test taking abilities and signed me up for the best, and most expensive program - the Kaplan prep. I spent an entire summer commuting to the Bronx, right next to Bronx Science in fact, taking this course, doing extra activities and practice exams hoping to get into the school of my dreams, which was planted right in front of me. I knew I wasn't the best, so I strived to at least achieve for 2nd best. And as an uptown girl, the commute would have been better anyway ;) 

For those of you unfamiliar, the specialized high school test was basically a pre-pre SAT. It followed the same format, and had a reading comprehension and a math section. There was zero open ended sections, other than the math work. 

Anyway, so the day came and went and the result were in. What do you think happened? I was an imbecile of course. I remember my crush asking me which school I got into. Like not getting into any school was even an option. I guess I wasn't an option. Well, at this point I disappointed everybody so I had no choice but to move on with my life and look at the "normal" schools. These weren't bad, there were some really good ones. And lucky for me, I got into the "best alternative school", which to my absolute joy was Beacon, a portfolio-based school. Where test scores were not factored into an admissions decision. What? What was this place? How had I never heard of this school before? Sitting in my little world of specialized school planning I hadn't even considered alternatives that would be so much better for my personal education and learning. 

Looking back now, if I had by some miracle gotten into Bronx Science, I'm pretty sure I would have completely flunked out of school. It wasn't the place for me. There were tests upon tests for every little thing. Beacon, on the other hand waived so many NY State Regents. They allowed me to flourish in my creativity and make interesting presentations for my final grades. For one, I interviewed a neighborhood who has been imprisoned and wrote a 10-page paper on the Rikers Island jail complex. Then, for my final presentation I dressed up as a prisoner and acted out the facts that I learned about while doing my research. I was so nervous to do something like this. It wasn't like me at all as a shy kid to come out of my shell, act in front of two teachers who were grading me and speak up, shout and perform anything at all. I was always too scared to even raise my hand to ask permission to use the bathroom. Beacon definitely did me good, I excelled there. If I hadn't failed the specialized high school test, I wouldn't have the confidence I have today while speaking up, reaching out to people of different levels in the workplace or saying "no" when I have too much work piled up. These are all real-world skills they say they don't teach you in school, but lucky for me, mine did. 

All of it translated into the same success I had in college. As I kid, I always wanted to be a manager. I just wanted to tell people what to do. Looking at all the majors in college, I laughed at those like psychology, philosophy- what jobs were those people going to do? I wanted to become a Business Manager. Manage a business, run things, make things happen - that sounded more like me. At Rutgers, I had to get into the Business School to major in Business Management. That meant straight A's at the very least in the prerequisites; Microeconomics, Macroeconomics, Statistics for Business and some other core classes. Everything else was fine- extracurriculars, essays, I did all that. 

When someone asks me how college went, I tell them my favorite class of all was Macroeconomics. You'd assume I did well in it, right? Well, I got a D. I learned absolutely everything. I was fascinated by the concept of Supply and Demand. This explained so much! I went to every single lecture, I had a study group, I was totally interested in the topic and super engaged. So what went wrong? There was not a single open-ended answer on the exams. The course curriculum was 3 exams and a final. That's it. That's all you had to do. People didn't even come to class, they just took the exam and did better than me. When I saw those questions phrased on a paper in a different way from which I had learned, I couldn't think. I couldn't process. I'd spend the time to re-write them in my own words. This took forever, it still didn't make sense and I didn't know how to find the answer. I tried all the different methods. I'd eliminate the two obviously incorrect choices. I had a 50% chance every time, but a 50 wouldn't pass me. I got the wrong one. 50% of the time. so I'd get a 50, maybe a 60 at best. Even with the curve, this put me just below a 70 every time. 67, 68, even a 72. D+ for you, Elina. 

I was mortified. I was a good student. I rarely got a B. I never got a C. What was a D? Should I have gone to Bronx Science? Would they have prepared me better? I wasn't getting into the Business school. Not with a D in Macroeconomics. Apparently even if you get all A's in the pre-requisites the admissions was very selective. So this meant I couldn't be a manager, right? I couldn't tell people what to do because I got a D. 

I had to rethink my entire strategy. Do I drop out? I couldn't tell my parents. I couldn't tell anyone. What would happen? What should I do? Major in psychology? 

Ding ding, luck came at me again. Welcome to Information Technology and Informatics, a communications- focused IT program. Small classes, small groups and hands on learning. Projects. Group work. Presentations. Yes! This was it, this was me. And this is how I succeeded. I didn't think I'd make it through school. I had no idea how I'd get a degree. To this day, I feel like I barely made it. People ask me if I want to go back for my Master's. What do you think my answer is? Hell no. "I hated school" .. it wasn't that I really, actually hated school. I hated what they put me through to learn my way. I hated how hard it was to get people to understand that there isn't just one, standardized way to learn. It wasn't like I had a disability to report. That wasn't legit, that wasn't honest. Maybe some would argue that I do have a learning disability. But that's just ignorant. We all learn differently. That's it.