THE EXAMINATION SYSTEM

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22259, 11 May 1934, Page 8

THE EXAMINATION SYSTEM

The examination system has few friends. It is probable that it has as many as it merits. It is frequently wounded in the house of those who are supposed to be its friends. and who have to operate it. And the volume of criticism of it is being constantly augmented. The condemnation of examinations that was expressed this week by Mr L. J. Wild, principal of the Feilding Agricultural High School, lacked nothing in respect of vigour and of incisiveness. The defects and the evils of the examination system, as realised by every person who has given consideration to the subject, were ruthlessly laid bare by him. Examinations, he said, " restricted initiative, narrowed the field of inquiry, and restrained the natural curiosity of

pupils." This must inevitably be the result of a system in which the scope of an examination is restricted to certain periods and to certain lines of study. It equally follows that the effect of the system must be. that teaching is degraded to cramming and that learning is reduced to mere skimming. It is not necessary that a person should be an educational expert in order that he should perceive the unsoundness of a system which operates ini tbis_ way or, at any rate, iadmits of being operated in this way.. ,The mischief may, of course, lie in the use to which the system is put as much as it lies in the system itself,, But the system is also gravely indicted on the ground that it is. injurious to the health of. ■many who sit for examination, particularly of girls at an age when there are medical reasons why they should not be severely exposed to the strain of competitive tests, that it is liable to cause the breakdown of sensitive candidates, and that it does not provide a reliable and satisfactory proof of qualification. Unfortunately those who realise most fully the weaknesses of the examination system seem to be not in agreement concerning a substitute for it. It is necessary that there should be. some standard of attainment at each step in education. There must be some method by which, the degree of progress that has been made by a pupil may be satisfactorily measured and by which the teacher's appraisement of the qualification of a pupil may be checked. For all that is said and done at educational meetings and : conferences throughout the world, there is no consensus of authoritative opinion concerning the character and method of the tests that should be applied to satisfy the needs of education.