Watch John Oliver Explain How Absurd the US Standardized Testing System Is
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver / HBO.
John Oliver does a damn good job of explaining how ridiculous our standardized testing system is.
Why you can trust usMay 8, 2015 
Pearson Education makes up about 40 percent of the country’s standardized testing market—”the educational equivalent of Time Warner Cable,” in John Oliver’s words.”Either you’ve never had an interaction with them and don’t care, or they’ve ruined your fucking life.”
This week on Last Week Tonight, Oliver said the company has seen enormous profits in recent years, despite receiving a number of complaints about its grading system and the content of the tests themselves.
Although it’s difficult, and often illegal, to obtain the material in standardized tests, Oliver’s team was able to get their hands on one question that many students complained about: A question about a talking pineapple and a hare competing in a race.
Confused? Yeah, so were we.
Check out our coverage of the movement to end standardized testing from our Education Uprising issue,
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