In helping professions such as psychology, counseling, social work, and education, it is imperative that we as professionals understand tests and are able to administer them correctly to our clients or students. Tests should be selected carefully, as each has a purpose and, as we know, there are biases within various tests. A partial test is one in which there are methodical distinctions in the meaning of test scores related to different groups. Most tests are well formulated; however none are absolute. Tests are often administered to draw substantial conclusions that will affect the test taker's life. The candidate is not aware of these biases that are for or against specific groups of people and the results could have a major effect on the candidate. Testing has become an important aspect of American society. In academia, test scores are used to determine whether a student will graduate from high school, selecting students for college admissions, placing students in special education, and for various other reasons. In the corporate setting, companies can use tests to select people for job placement. In the United States, testing is unavoidable and test results could have a vast influence on individuals. Despite the commonality of testing, a large discrepancy in results exists between individuals of certain races, social classes, and geographic locations. It had previously been assumed that the generous gap in test scores was due to different education systems, however researchers are now looking for other justifications. Is it possible that these tests are wrong? Did they measure what they intended to measure? Individuals in education, who agree that the individual...... middle of paper ......work: Free Press.Hilliard, AG, III (1995), ed. Testing African American students: Special reprint of the Negro Educational Review. Chicago: Third World Press. Jencks, C. and Phillips, M. (1998), eds. The black-white test score gap.Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.Jenson, A. R. (1980). Bias in mental tests. New York: Free Press. Matarazzo, J. (1972) Measurement and evaluation of adult intelligence according to Wechsler. Baltimore: Williams and Wilkins. Reynolds, C.R. and Brown, Robert T. (1984), eds. Perspectives on bias in mental tests. New York: Plenum Press. Thorndike, R. (1971). Concepts of cultural equity. Journal of EducationalMeasurement, 8(2), 63-70. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/pss/1433959Whiston, S. (2009). Principles and applications of evaluation in counseling. (3rd ed.). Belmont, CA: Brooks/Cole, Cengage Learning.