This qualitative case study provided a narrative portrait of 12 students in the 11th grade in one north Texas district who failed the initial administration of the Texas Educational Assessment of Minimum Skills (TEAMS) exit-level test. It also presented an account of their perceptions of the test and their efforts to overcome this educational hurdle. The following conclusions were drawn from the study. Limited English proficiency (LEP) students had difficulty mastering the language arts section of the test. A majority of the students reported that TEAMS failure had no social impact. Most of the students declined district-offered remediation. Students tended to perceive the test as a personal challenge. Those students who attended remedial tutoring sessions performed better on the following retest than those who declined remediation. Hispanic and Asian students expressed additional study as being the key to passing the test. Black students felt that the key to passing was to spend sufficient time while taking the test. Those students who were more verbal during their interviews tended to be more successul in passing the language arts section of the TEAMS. The following recommendations were made from the study: (a) students who fail the TEAMS by minimal margins should be …