ABC's of Testing

I just got out of a faculty meeting this morning and wanted to share before I forgot about it this afternoon.  The focus of today's meeting was to discuss logistics of the ACT testing day for juniors that is coming up in March.  Teachers have various duties that day, including signing students in, proctoring the test, and even serving breakfast to students.  The principal could not stress enough the importance of this test.  Along with helping students, the ACT also affects the rating of the school based on college and career readiness.  Obviously, I have heard about the ACT.  From my own experience, I have also heard about the PLAN (pre-ACT) and PSAT (pre-SAT.)  I was surprised to hear about the ASVAB, Compass, and Coyote tests.  So, together, we have the ACT, PLAN, PSAT, ASVAB, Compass, Coyote, EOC, etc.  Once I got past the overwhelming number of letters thrown at me, I began thinking about how much students are tested.  Add this to the in class exams, homework, and quizzes, and I'm sure students are overwhelmed as well.  Its made me begin to think about ways to incorporate test prep into my class in ways that don't overwhelm students and seem applicable to them given the unit we are in.