"Putting 100% of our eggs in the basket of standardized testing is absolutely the wrong approach to education," posits Executive Director of Gallup Education Brandon Busteed. Busteed delivered this hard-hitting message to a room full of top education leaders, including U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, at the first ever "Education Datapalooza," hosted last month by the White House and Department of Education.
In education, "our biggest problem is actually our focus on the problem," said Busteed. Education leaders are mainly focused on what is wrong with schools, how ineffective our teachers are, and what our students don't know. It is time to change this, according to Busteed, and focus instead on cultivating students' strengths -- not fixing their weaknesses.
"People who become successful didn't get that way by focusing on improving weaknesses. They found out what they were good at --their innate talents-- and they turned those talents into strengths by putting them to work every single day," Busteed explained.
Busteed argued that education leaders should drastically reduce the U.S. educational system's current focus on standardized testing. Schools and teachers should instead spend the majority of their time delivering "individualized and personalized" education by building students' educational experiences around their innate talents.
For more information on how Gallup gives education leaders tools and advice to help teachers, students, and schools succeed, visit the Gallup Education Center.