Even though I have worked as a college professor for 15 years, I decided last winter to take the SAT and ACT examinations that my students needed to enter the institution where I teach, Temple University. Why? After nearly a year of preparing my daughter for the examinations, I started to wonder if the existing tests actually provided a good guide to assess knowledge.

A commission created by the National Association for College Admission Counseling recommended last September that colleges and universities move away from their reliance on the scores. The commission released its critique after evaluating the effectiveness or lack thereof of standardized tests for more than a year. After taking both tests, I couldn't agree more with the commission's recommendations. I found that the tests emphasized speed and stamina over knowledge, and they failed to provide an adequate measure of what a student might actually understand.

The SAT comprised 10 sections that haphazardly whipsawed the mind from writing to reading to math. I started by writing an essay, then spent the remainder of the test zigzagging back and forth among mathematics, reading, and grammar. Just as I'd fallen into a mathematical groove, it was time to move on to the reading section. A second math section, or perhaps a grammar test, might follow a reading section. Moreover, I had about one minute to answer each question —almost no time for any form of critical analysis or contemplation. What went through my mind? Keep up the pace.

The SAT essay question asked, "Is compromise always the best way to resolve a conflict?" The answer: Of course not! Ask African-Americans about the compromise of the U.S. Constitution that left them as slaves. Ask women about the right to vote. Ask the relatives of those who died in World War II at the hands of the Germans after Britain and the Soviet Union initially tried compromise with Hitler. The list goes on and on.

Simply put, the question is inane. Further, it elicits an answer that often fails to include analysis of research and inclusion of data —two key components of critical thinking. This type of question fails into the category of asking a student how he or she feels emotionally about an issue rather than what he or she thinks intellectually.

Moving on to the grammar section of the SAT: I teach writing and journalism, yet I found some questions were written so awkwardly —although they were grammatically correct —that I wanted to take a red pen to them and demand that they be rewritten.

The math section was no less frustrating. Again, I had about one minute to answer each question. Speed was more important than analysis.

While a few of the math questions were relatively straightforward, most of them were so convoluted that they seemed intended to trick me rather than to test my knowledge of arithmetic, algebra, or geometry. As some observers have noted, the section doesn't test a knowledge or understanding of math so much as how well one has learned "SAT math." Dana Mosely, a math teacher who has created a series of DVD's to tutor students for the SAT, has said that in an actual classroom he would never use many of his suggested methods, such as simple guessing by elimination, and plugging in the answers from the choices rather than performing the math to come up with the correct answer. The SAT has even created its own mathematical symbols that can only be anticipated if the student has studied SAT math.

The ACT, which I took a month later, was different but no more effective as a gauge of students' knowledge. It had four parts: writing, reading, mathematics, and science. The structure eliminated the problem I had with the SAT —that is, having to bounce back and forth from one subject to another. But the required stamina for nearly five hours of testing was difficult. As on the SAT, I had about one minute per answer in math. By the time I reached the final section, science, my mind was nearly numb. Not surprisingly, I scored the lowest on it.

Again, the writing question bordered on the ludicrous. It asked whether sporting events should eliminate scoring in order to de-emphasize winning over perseverance and teamwork. The only way one could answer such a question adequately is to determine statistically how effective such a change would be. Then a critical analysis of the effects could be determined, rather than a series of anecdotal stories, which is all the ACT question could elicit.

A problem I find with many students today is that how they feel about an issue has become more important than what they think about it and how they can support that position with research, data, and analysis. But if even the ACT and SAT emphasize emotion over thought, I can see why my students and their high-school teachers have focused on that approach.

The reading section, as on the SAT, included an odd hodgepodge of subjects —a science-fiction space ride, a study of computers, the increase in paper production at the International Monetary Fund. I object to the inane material included in both tests. Many great authors have written many fine works in English over the past few centuries. Why not use passages from them, rather than trendy articles about nothing of particular significance?

My SAT scores improved 195 points overall from when I took them last in 1968. Although my math score fell slightly, I earned 750 out of 800 on the recently added writing section. I missed four questions out of 49, an embarrassment because I teach writing. (I didn't take the ACT in high school, so I have no means of comparison.) Nevertheless, my scores would have qualified me for entrance into most colleges. My daughter received inquiries from more than 200 colleges, and her scores allowed her to enroll in her preferred institution. Yet both of us thought that the tests failed to demonstrate what we really knew.

When I took the SAT in high school, I scored significantly higher in math than in writing. In college I took business administration, calculus, accounting, and statistics my first year. I performed well but found myself far more engaged when I transferred into journalism and English literature —my weakest subjects, according to the SAT. I graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a double major in English literature and journalism and went on to graduate school.

Had I followed the path suggested by my SAT scores, I probably would have become a disgruntled numbers cruncher instead of a satisfied journalist who worked for more than 20 years at the Associated Press, Newsweek, and ABC News before joining academe in 1994. I wonder how many students fall into the trap of basing college and career decisions on their standardized-test scores. I am glad I did not.

If the testing companies fail to provide improved tools to assess students' knowledge, then each college should create its own measurement tool, based on what educators think would identify the type of students they would like to see at their institutions. It's too easy to depend on standardized tests because they offer a quantifiable score. Now, however, an estimated 500 colleges, including some prestigious institutions like Smith College and Wake Forest University, have made the ACT and SAT optional. That's a good start toward re-examining whether these tests actually can predict a student's success in college. The academy must continue to question their value.

I have participated in decisions to grant admission and financial aid to undergraduate and graduate students, and those students' standardized-test scores played a significant role in my evaluations. No longer: I will change my approach in the future based on my experience with the ACT and SAT. I hope other educators do the same.

Christopher Harper is an associate professor and co-director of the Multimedia Urban Reporting Lab in the department of journalism at Temple University.