Educational Reforms Mean Knowledge Now Matters

By Roman Tashleetsky

The end of this academic year was especially challenging for thousands of Ukrainian secondary school graduates. They were participating in a test-run of a new examination process. If implemented, it promises to address various inadequacies in Ukraine’s educational system, most notably widespread corruption.

The new process aims to provide an unbiased way of giving high school graduates, regardless of their social or geographic status, equal opportunities to enter higher educational institutions. Another one of its strategic purposes is the integration of Ukraine’s educational system with Europe’s, where similar tests are common.

Ukraine inherited, from Soviet times, a system where secondary school-leavers had to first pass exams at their high schools, and then take additional exams to enter university. At schools, pupils were tested by their teachers. Usually an exam involved a set of 40-50 questions, which pupils knew beforehand; during the exam they answered three random questions out of this set.  University entrance exams had a similar procedure–the only difference being that students answered questions orally before a university commission.

With the new process, students write only one external test, the results of which are valid for both graduating from a high school and entering a university. The new process is called external testing because tests are set, conducted and graded by independent and external testing centres.

The time for such a process had come long ago. Though the old process has its advantages (for one, it enables a personal and individualized approach), it became obvious that it could not guarantee objectivity and was open to corruption.

At prestigious schools, children of teaching staff often get higher grades compared with ordinary pupils.  And, despite a high level of competition, many academically weak students managed to pass university entrance exams because their parents used their influence to “book” them a place at university or bribed the examiners.

The new exam system has many features to ensure this will no longer be possible. Teachers from all over Ukraine submit questions that are entered into a database. Then, a computer generates different versions of exams so that it is unlikely that even two pupils will have the same combination of questions. Students are not allowed to take anything other than a pen and water to the examinational hall.  Invigilators are teachers, but not specialists in the subject being tested, so they cannot help or prompt students during exams.

Completed exams are packed into a special envelope that can be opened only once. The envelope is delivered to a testing centre where it is marked by a computer. People who process answers deal with barcodes, not names.

In this way, pupils get an unbiased assessment of their knowledge. To a computer, it doesn’t matter whether an exam-taker is from a school for diplomats’ children or from a desolate village or what grades individual students had in the past.  Only the students’ current knowledge of a subject is being evaluated.

Of course, this is not convenient for both those who used to solve their educational problems with bribes and those used to getting these bribes. That’s why the changes provoked criticism among some parents and educational institutions’ representatives. Nevertheless, the Ministry of Education and Science seems to have a firm resolution to introduce the external testing next year (this year only 10 per cent of school-leavers participated in the new process). 

The technology supporting the new process was developed and tested for three years by the Center of Testing Technologies (CTT, based in Kyiv), a non-governmental organization funded by the Soros Foundation.  This should further ensure impartiality. And, according to CTT’s website (www.ukrtest.org), this year, the state is for the first time financing external testing, which demonstrates the government’s support and, hopefully, serious intention of implementing it throughout Ukraine next year.

Some parents and teachers are sceptical about the new system and say that its results will also be bought only for larger sums. Probably their doubts are based on an unsuccessful attempt to bring in new tests at the beginning of the 90s. But in that last attempt at reform exams were evaluated by teachers from the schools of the students and the educational system was not properly prepared for the changes.

The school-leavers I know are generally satisfied with the innovation. For conscientious students, there’s nothing to fear. On the contrary, they can now try their academic strength and compete to enter spots at top universities that were previously available mostly for the rich.

On the whole, external testing offers transparency and equal opportunities for all. It will be beneficial for ordinary pupils, particularly, and for Ukrainian education, generally.  

Roman Tashleetsky is a Ukrainian graduate student at the Taras Shevchenko National University, Kyiv. He holds a diploma in English and French Language and Literature from the Lesia Ukrainka National University of Volyn.