Standardized testing has lead to a world where short-term memorization is valued over the ability to think critically and solve problems. We need to move past the idea that being able to memorize the largest amount of information is a sign of intelligence. The best college instructor I had told us on the first day of class that he didn’t do tests, but preferred to give us open-book projects with the kind of questions we couldn’t just look up answers to. His goal was to teach us to think like scientists in his field, not just memorize facts or formulas.