MATRICULATION TEST.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 20130, 15 December 1928, Page 14

MATRICULATION TEST.

SCHOOL WORK DOMINATED.

" MARGINAL " CANDIDATES.

DEFECTS IN THE EXAMINATION. That a reform of the present system of matriculation examination was long over due was the opinion expressed by Miss E M. Johnston, headmistress of the Auckland Girls' Grammar School, at the annual prize-giving ceremony yesterday The school syllabus was still dominated and was likely to continue to bo domin ated by the demands of the matriculation examination, said Miss Johnston. As more and more candidates presented themselves for this examination, matters grew worse instead of better from year to year, she continued. The present posi tion was that university undertook to mark, in six weeks, over four thousand papers in subjects such as English and arithmetic. It was. of course, impossible for any one examiner to mark all the papers in any subject, and equally im possible to maintain an objective stan dard when the papers were marked by different examiners The result was that, as far as pupils on the margin were concerned, success or failure was more the result of chanco than of any considered judgment on the part of the examiners

"1 am not in favour, at the present stage, of a full system of accrediting for this examination—other reforms, I think, must como first—but 1 do feel that, in the case of 'marginal' candidates, and in cases where a pupil is ill on day or days of the examination, the school record might well be taken into account," said the principal. "It is surely a mere truism to state that such a record, cover ing a period of three, four or five years, is of somewhat more value than a three hour test given under examination condi tions.

"The university seems to be obsessed by a fear that a system of accrediting would lower the standard of the exam ination, but in a great many cases it passes pupils whom tho schools would unhesitatingly fail. Many of tho papers are set on obsolete lines, and put a premium on the work of the 'crammer' j they are marked, very often, by examiners who have had no experience of teaching in secondary schools;, there is, in practice, no provision for the reconsideration of certain 'marginal' cases of failure, and no provision whatever for the granting of aegrotat passes—and these are only some of the indictments which may be brought against the present system."