Dr. Wes: School is out, and that means the end of testing season. Finally.

Back in western Kansas we had a saying, “You don’t make the pig any fatter just by weighing her.” We didn’t actually raise any pigs in that part of the state, but nobody questioned what that old saw meant. This idea that measurement doesn’t change what you measure was lost on the Bush administration in 2001 when it foisted No Child Left Behind on an unsuspecting nation.

Dr. Wes Crenshaw and Kyra Haas

The key element of this scheme was that we would test the bejabbers out of kids and that these results would then be used to…uh… That’s where things fell apart. Because Republicans have long favored a voucher system in which parents get back tax money to use to put their kids in private schools, they weren’t really as interested in improving public schools as they might have you believe. So, once those results were in from all that testing, their solution was to put failing schools on notice and then de-accredit them and make them pay to have their kids educated in adjacent schools.

That never made any sense in 2001, and it makes less sense now. Yet, after campaigning against it, President Obama has pretty much doubled down on this idea that you make teachers teach better and schools school more by testing kids again and again.

John Oliver, whose HBO show is becoming the go-to place for smart, satirical, and spot-on journalism, recently did an episode on this. As with all his shows you can find this one for free here or Google “John Oliver testing.” Nobody has explained the testing morass in 30 minutes better than Oliver. It’s worth your time just to see the dancing monkey — pretty much the perfect metaphor for what our kids are being asked to do every year at test time.

After you watch the film, you may wonder why you’re subjecting your children to a series of tests that really don’t benefit them very much. I wonder that myself. As best I can tell, members of the educational-industrial complex like Pearson, who own not only the testing but the study materials for the testing, need our money really badly, and schools feel they’re sitting at the end of a cocked gun, forced to join in.

All this needs to end. Our monkeys have done enough dancing. We should get back to what school is about: learning.

Kyra: Under the watchful eye of the head principal and my Advanced Algebra II teacher, I clearly remember the sheer terror that accompanied my first standardized test. I transferred from private school the year before, so I had never undertaken an exam in that format or climate. To make matters worse, my phone went off halfway through — the chorus from Wreckx-N-Effect’s “Rump Shaker.” Yes, I was a pretty cool freshman.

While I personally have had a limited experience with standardized tests, my high school friends have not been so fortunate. Of course, there are some who find the tests mildly irritating but without strong effect on their lives. For others, the exams have proved stressful and problematic. John Oliver compared these tests to the education version of Time Warner Cable — either you hardly ever interact with them, or they ruin your life.

I agree with Wes. Children have done enough dancing. However, I still believe a form of standardized testing is necessary to maintain consistent expectations for education across the 50 states. When the level of that standard rests in the hands of one or two testing companies, that’s where we have a problem. The idea of having a check on students’ learning is not a poor one. The format, however, needs definite revising before it can be looked to as the true calculator of students’ performance.

As Americans, we want to see our country move up in worldwide science and math rankings, but this should not be done at the expense of our teachers, some of whom feel forced to teach to the test more than actually teaching.

— Wes Crenshaw, Ph.D., ABPP, is author of “I Always Want to Be Where I’m Not: Successful Living with ADD & ADHD.” Learn about his writing and practice at dr-wes.com. Kyra Haas is a Free State High School senior who blogs at justfreakinghaasome.wordpress.com. Send your confidential 200-word question to ask@dr-wes.com. Double Take opinions and advice are not a substitute for psychological services.