Teachers assign better scores to papers with better penmanship. I forget how strong the effect was, but using a keyboard does help equalize some biases.

Keyboards and screens in an exam hall then?

Typewriters for everyone!

Why equalize that bias?

Because there are a plethora of disabilities which make neat penmanship difficult.

Scan the hand-written work back into a digital format and present the results to the teachers for evaluation in their preferred typeface.

In Italy we test with pen and paper and the quality of italian schools is abysmal. The point is not the test, is the quality of the teachers. They are the only hope to form good humans, not some standardized test.

Or, preferably, admit that testing wasn't a good idea to begin with and focus on optimizing children for learning, not test-taking.

I don't even think we're just talking about children either. Test taking in academia (university and above) could stand a much needed fresh look.

I am hopeful that a change happens in academia to prepare students for jobs, which is why they are going to school in the first place. Yes, students need to learn how to "think", but really they are wanting to get the technical skills to perform their duties more than anything.

We have bestowed too much credence in traditional academia not useful to the average person or average job. College is a "game" for most students, and they put up going through the motions of testing, etc. for the sake of the diploma at the end.

I hope we're going to enter a new era of what college means for those looking to get something different out of it.

At some point you need to see what people know to measure their progress and help them.