The importance of developing culturally specific tests for black children is addressed, along with the overall issue of whether a criterion used to discriminate among groups is valid for the population for which it is used. In addition, a brief historical review illustrates accessibility to full participation of citizens and noncitizens of early civilizations as well as present-day performance on pencil-paper measures as a means to gain access to fuller benefits in society. An illustration of misuse of testing results was the use of Army data by C. C. Brigham (1923) to indicate the ability of immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe. Data on recent Italian immigrants were used to indicate innate ethnic differences and there was no cross-tabulation by years of schooling or other relevant factors. A 1974 study (Robert Williams) measured the effects of test instructions written in black dialectical language and in standard English on the performance of black children during intelligence testing. Children who took the test representative of their cultural background scored significantly higher than the other group. It is suggested that a criterion will be enhanced if it is developed by the population for which the measure is designed, and that minorities engage in such research and evaluation activities. The design and use of the Pupil Evaluation Measure with prekindergarten children attending a federally funded program at Baltimore City Public Schools is also addressed. (SW)