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Standardized testing is at cross purposes with many of the most important purposes of public education. It doesn't measure big-picture learning, critical thinking, perseverance, problem solving, creativity or curiosity, yet those are the qualities great teaching brings out in a student.

I'm not saying standardized tests are the worst ever, but there's an in-between and I don't think we're there yet. That's what I mean when I say I have an issue with it. There's no way a kid can learn in a class with 40 to 45 people. I had the power to get out of that system and pursue things that I wanted to do and I did that.

Elite private-school educations leave students unprepared for a standardized test with which their public school counterparts are innately familiar.

Appropriate assessments are a crucial part of effectively educating students. But they only measure a narrow segment of what kids need to learn.

If we're going to have standards in schools, let's be honest and have standards.

Education standards need to be set at the state level. High standards are an important way to ensure that the education system we are funding is actually working and producing, at a minimum, what we would expect it to.

As we embark on something as ambitious as the Common Core, educators must be able to teach to the standards with the necessary support and collaboration and without the sense that there will be dire consequences if students, schools and their tests don't make the grade.

Beginning with the No Child Left Behind law and continuing today with Race to the Top, the federal emphasis on standardized assessments has become so excessive that it has modified state and district behavior in troubling ways.

Second, when comparing private school and public school test scores, it's like apples and oranges. Public schools have to take everyone, but private schools can be selective. It's not accurate or fair to compare the job they do.

I hate tests. It's a really lousy way to judge a person's ability.