Testing the Tester?
On one sunny morning, the newspaper headlined "tough paper, students look gloomy". It was actually the very next day of the physics exam of Class XII CBSE Board. Many students expressed their views, saying that the paper was hard, too many numericals which had taken the toll, and the paper was prepared cicumlocutely. It was not a one of case.
On the same day, there was a GRE test held in different parts of the world. On asking the students, who came out from the Gurgaon Test Centre, how did they appear? The answer was somber, "the R.C. was very hard."
A few days back, a brilliant student of 15 years old was narrating his views of the SAT examination, which he had appeared lately. He expounded the exam as "Seriously Attributed to Traumatise". He however explained it, "the Americans are very sharp, and this exam is for the best students only. The ones who appear, can answer 60% of the question asked, but the remaining 40% are mind boggling".
All the above exams are meant for getting admission to colleges of the next stages. These exams are mostly a persevering, screening process for the students, and have nothing to do with cudgeling out the cream out of the students. Even in doing these unbreakable screening processes, can the organization claim the transparency in the method? It's true, a miniscule few out of the millions are scoring a hundred percent score. Some of the questions are found to be really unanswerable. What is the difficulty if some more could score hundred percents. The heavens will not fall, if that has to happen. Any exam should place its standard to such a point so that the students appearing feel that the test given is an honest maneuvering of their skills.
To make these exams more transparent by the nature of the test, the Boards may initiate to ask few teachers, authors, randomly to appear in these tests. Like in the CBSE XII board papers of physics, a few physics school teachers should also appear in the physics test, along with the students. The score obtained by the teachers would be considered as the benchmark of that subject. Likewise, other teachers of different subjects will also have to face the board tests. It is prudent in calling for the renowned authors to appear in the tests for SAT and GRE and other such tests, not only to boost the students, but also demonstrate the fairness of these exams.
It is easier to prepare question papers by learned, matured people. Let these matured people face the dreadfulness of these papers and give evidence about the transparency of the test in particular, and education in general.
On the same day, there was a GRE test held in different parts of the world. On asking the students, who came out from the Gurgaon Test Centre, how did they appear? The answer was somber, "the R.C. was very hard."
A few days back, a brilliant student of 15 years old was narrating his views of the SAT examination, which he had appeared lately. He expounded the exam as "Seriously Attributed to Traumatise". He however explained it, "the Americans are very sharp, and this exam is for the best students only. The ones who appear, can answer 60% of the question asked, but the remaining 40% are mind boggling".
All the above exams are meant for getting admission to colleges of the next stages. These exams are mostly a persevering, screening process for the students, and have nothing to do with cudgeling out the cream out of the students. Even in doing these unbreakable screening processes, can the organization claim the transparency in the method? It's true, a miniscule few out of the millions are scoring a hundred percent score. Some of the questions are found to be really unanswerable. What is the difficulty if some more could score hundred percents. The heavens will not fall, if that has to happen. Any exam should place its standard to such a point so that the students appearing feel that the test given is an honest maneuvering of their skills.
To make these exams more transparent by the nature of the test, the Boards may initiate to ask few teachers, authors, randomly to appear in these tests. Like in the CBSE XII board papers of physics, a few physics school teachers should also appear in the physics test, along with the students. The score obtained by the teachers would be considered as the benchmark of that subject. Likewise, other teachers of different subjects will also have to face the board tests. It is prudent in calling for the renowned authors to appear in the tests for SAT and GRE and other such tests, not only to boost the students, but also demonstrate the fairness of these exams.
It is easier to prepare question papers by learned, matured people. Let these matured people face the dreadfulness of these papers and give evidence about the transparency of the test in particular, and education in general.
posted by Mahi Prasad | 1:42 PM
1 Comments:
well i would strongly disagree with you. i do believe that giving extremely tough papers does not prove anything. but if you had noticed the exam patterns for the last year CBSE boards of X as well as XII, there were plenty of students scoring even 100%. this really does not make sense. how can you expect to score 100 % in subjects like english and yet the results showed nearly a score of students with the perfect score even for their english exam.
a series of scornful reports against the board authorities from various facets of society has probably resulted in them taking this decision of making the tests tougher.
and speaking of SAT and GRE. they are standardized tests. and they dont claim to measure anything other than the general range in which a student lies.
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