Rutgers Brian Leonard in a drill

I’m trying to step off the emotional cloud of my Giants’ indescribably glorious Super Bowl win and get back to reality. Euphoria is a great place to live, but life is an insistent creature that wants to move on and has a way of kicking you in the jujubes if you don’t. Wearing a cup won’t help, so I’ll start making the transition.

Which brings me to the upcoming NFL combine in Indianapolis. Okay, okay, it’s still football, but it’s not the Giants.

Pat Kirwan’s blog at NFL.Com has some interesting observations on the value of the combines, which is not a gathering of John Deere equipment; it’s where top college football prospects perform rigorous physical tests for NFL coaches and scouts to demonstrate their strength, speed, agility and flexibility in the hopes that they’ll be drafted as high as possible.

Kirwan’s main point is that the combine results should not be the priority it once was in the evaluation of football talent. One NFL executive made a telling comment that caught my eye. He said that “The tests had their place in helping us determine certain traits we were looking for but now the kids rehearse the combine tests so much that it is not the indicator it once was.”

In short, athletes usually do very well in the combines, football players may not. Put another way, athletes with great workout skills simply may not turn out to be good players.

“… rehearse the combine tests.”

That remark reminded me of how important standardized testing in our schools has become and how the need for improved scores has forced many schools and teachers “to teach to the test” and not always to teach in a broad, life-affecting way. Teaching to the test is a process not unlike athletes rehearsing the drills of the combine.

Both present problems. Our kids are learning how to score within the limits of the test, but that’s no guarantee that they’ll develop into inquisitive citizen-thinkers with a desire to learn. Only a dedicated teacher and committed parents can produce that. Moreover, the results might not be known for years, but the government and parents (and obviously the NFL) want answers now.

Like the combines’ workout warriors who can bench press astounding weight, dazzle you with their speed and agility yet often come up short as on-the-field, game-ready football players, the kids might score well enough to give your school the boost it needs to earn the next infusion of state and federal money. Does it mean that they have what it takes to think, learn and write critically throughout their lives.

This is neither a criticism or approval of standardized tests or No Child Left Behind, but rather an alert to yet another signal that our culture is short-sighted and limited in how it chooses to increase and measure improvement. Just as combine results don’t always predict how an athlete plays football, fifth, eighth or eleventh grade test scores don’t predict how someone will do in the game of life.

The long view takes time to determine. It’s the difference between a snapshot and a video. A test is a measure that’s frozen in time; education is a process that should always evolve and continue. How the hell do you measure that with tests?

Kirwan offers some questions that the combines can’t answer even though the answers are critical qualities coaches look for in a player. “Does he have football intelligence?,” “Can a guy tackle?,” “Can he learn and adjust?,” “How does a guy prepare?”

These are game day questions, not test questions. We need to ask the life questions for our kids.

I’m not against testing as such. It’s certainly an indicator of talent and ability, just as the combines show NFL coaches an athletes’ skills. What bothers me is the mind set I think testing represents; it reinforces the sad truth that we’re a society with little patience, no time for reflection and an obsessive need for results now. We look for quick solutions and short term fixes to our problems. Band aids! We’re like that Little Dutch Boy stopping a leak in the dike with his finger, only to see that many more holes are springing leaks. Not enough fingers. Certainly not enough band aids.

And so goes our solutions to these problems — testing as a significant measure of a kid’s educational progress. Of course they did well, they rehearsed. We have to do better than that. As some self-help radio shrink often says, “Life is not a dress rehearsal.”

Another combine indicator is the interview process, which Kirwan labels a “caution-flag” event. “The athletes are so well rehearsed [for the types of questions they'll be asked]” he writes, “it reminds me of a guy giving a deposition in a pre-trial hearing.” He adds that “the best interviewers in the NFL take the players out of their comfort zone and bring them to an unprepared area.”

And he describes how some innovative coaches are trying to do just that so they can get a better sense of how well the athlete can play the game, not simply show off their athletic attributes. To Kirwan it seems that the coaches and scouts are finally getting it. They’re learning that the combines are a tool, not the final word on an athlete’s eventual contribution to the team and the sport as a player.

The combines will be fine. How long will it take our schools and parents to realize the truth about testing and develop innovative ways to measure how well our kids will do in life, not just in tests. Will we be fine?