The National Standards movement seeks to raise the quality of the American educational system. According to one of its chief architects, Diane Ravitch (2000), national standards give clear expectations for students, teachers, parents, colleges, and employers that will result in improved student achievement. Forty-nine of the fifty states (save Iowa) have implemented such standards. In many cases, they have raised scores. In Virginia, for example, scores are going up on standardized tests (Virginia Department of Education 2004). But what, ultimately, does this mean? Some states use only one standardized test. In Virginia, it is the Virginia Standards of Learning (SOL). This particular test is used because (1) it is cheap, (2) it is easy to read, and (3) it is simple to grade. The test is also extremely objective, leaving no room for graders' opinions and differences of viewpoints. Although multiple-choice standardized tests claim to measure every level of learning, they really only test knowledge recall. And educators, use these multiple-choice "bubble" tests to convince themselves that students truly "understand" whatthey are taught, as evidenced by a passing test score.