On balance, standardized testing is beneficial to K-12 education in the United States

First, addressing my opponents observation of my plagiarism. I have given credit to Lisa Adams as stated: Lisa Adams, Research Associate, Joseph Pedulla, Professor at Boston College, George Madaus, Professor at Boston College, 2003, Theory into practice, 42.1, p. 18-29 I would also like to point out that the link my opponent has posted is not valid. May I also ask for the source for your definition of Standardized Testing? Contention 1: Notice how my opponent said that the only way for a child to retain information is through a standardized test. However, that is not always true. Although there are students who study and remember information, many teachers will FOCUS on the test, and afterwards, forget about making sure the students remember. This is called teaching to the test. Many students will remember the information ONLY for the test, and not for remembering information in the future. Contention 2: Yes, standardized tests can compare students, but is that necessarily good? Like you stated in your last contention, standardized tests can BOOST your confidence, but when you are compared with other students for other districts, doesn't that tear down your confidence, knowing that colleges are looking for smart people and you just aren't the smartest. Also, as I pointed out in my case, standardized testing can discriminate against students who have just moved here from foreign countries, or their families are too poor to help provide a stable learning system. This can create achievement gaps between them and middle and upper class students who are given plenty of tools and guides to help their education. Contention 3: As my entire contention three says, teachers are often hurt by standardized tests, because it forces them to teach something they aren't used to teaching. I would also like to say that my opponent's "professionals" are just teachers and parents. And although they are somewhat connected to standardized tests(their students take the tests), they don't have the right to be called "professionals". Adding to that, notice how the resolution says "beneficial". This means that my opponent should focus on how it is "beneficial", not teachers having a bias towards standardized testing. Contention 4: I have done my own part of research. and have found that standardized testing is actually only a quarter of a percent of the total US education budget. The USA spends more than a billion dollars on Standardized Testing ALONE! Can you imagine what else we can do with this money, instead of using it on tests that students forget about in a month afterwards anyways? We can help support the fight against ISIS, we can advance our research on Ebola. We could do all sorts of things with the billion dollars we spend EACH year on standardized testing. Contention 5: Just because a test is "fair", does not mean it is "beneficial". A fair test could compose of random questions that anyone could answer, but that doesn't make it "beneficial". This argument is not relevant to this debate Contention 6: My opponent is using statistics to dehumanize students who have suicide. as they say, "On the news, you probably see stories about kids commiting suicide because of standardized testing. Those cases however, are extremely rare. What is common, is self esteem causing confidence. People tend to over exaggerate the small examples of bad things happening but tend to ignore positivity." Basically, what they are trying to say is that it's okay for a small fraction of students to suicide(STUDENTS!) because it helps the majority have confidence, which it doesn't necessarily, as I stated in my attack on their case. I would also like to point out that my opponent does not have any source or quote on this contention, making it a bias and frankly unfair contention. If my opponent were to have this contention standing at the end of the debate, I would like to kindly ask the judges to see that this contention has no warrant and should be ignored.