Throughout the 1990s, one state after another adopted prescriptive education standards enforced by frequent standardized testing, often of the high-stakes variety. A top-down, get-tough movement to impose "accountability" began to squeeze the life out of classrooms. Recently, politicians, corporate CEOs, and testing companies are trying to sell…

Defining the difficulty of a task includes how long the task takes; its features, complexity, and newness; and understanding/willingness to complete it. Problems with determining difficulty levels make it questionable to claim that higher levels of a qualifications framework are more difficult than lower levels. (SK)