As an academic, now as an Emeritus Professor of a US public University, and given that the members and user of this platform are academics either as Higher Education instructors or students, I wish to ask the following question:

Is the administration of tests, these days, the best means to determine successful progress towards and completion of a graduate level course at Private and Public Universities and Colleges in Western societies (and possibly in non-Western societies as well)?

My conclusion, after about 30 years as a professor at the University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas, USA, and as no longer active professor although heavily involved in research, is that tests these days (of the internet, the computer, and the cell phone) are obsolete and very imperfect means to determine whether a GRADUATE student is either successfully progressing through a graduate level course, or has successfully completed the course.

Here are the reasons why I think so, although during my active academic career I did administer tests for some of my graduate level courses. If I were to teach now, I would not have opted for submitting my graduate students to testing.

First, I think so because tests now can be very specific in view of an increasing specialization in all spheres of the academy, while at the same time and paradoxically all of the fields (in the Arts and Sciences and Humanities) are rapidly expanding in breath as well as in depth. Hence, tests are decreasingly reflective of a graduate class's material.

Second, I also think that an instructor's specialization increasingly makes choice of tests as well as evaluations of the tests highly personalized endeavors. Hence, these tests are less reflective of a student's mastery of the class's material, and more conformity to the particularities (and peculiarities) of the instructor.

Third, tests are artificial means to test memory and capacity to retrieve information by a student, given that the information sought is very likely available and easily accessible on and retrievable from the net.

There could be other reasons why tests are obsolete and highly imperfect means to achieve their supposed objectives as stated. However, I would like to see the audience's reaction especially in counter arguing my position against the administration of tests and the reasons why that I offered.

Thank you in advance,