A series of studies in a mature multimodal composing project demonstrates that through digital video (DV) composing about literature, diverse students, including many who struggled in school, learned new ways of engaging literature, performing meaning, and thinking symbolically through multimodal translations of the text. Students' focus in these classes on representing meaning changed the game of literature for them (Miller and McVee). They narrated their DV composing as purposeful creation, which materialized representations of literature in school and beyond for an audience, while producing intellectual and aesthetic satisfaction. However, the benefits of these new ways of learning are often abandoned by teachers in troubled urban districts who must struggle to raise student scores on high-stakes assessments that measure students' ability to respond in pre-specified ways using traditional pen and paper. Tight budgets and limited technology often result in test scores rather than student learning taking center stage. This article discusses how tensions in schools about state testing work against teaching innovations, but student DV composing serves as a powerful means of literature learning and authentic assessment of that learning.