Why standardised testing is archaic, harmful

Most of us grew up with standardised tests. UPSR awaited us at the end of our primary school. PMR was next, then SPM and STPM (or A-levels and its like). With the abolishment of UPSR and PMR, the next generation would do away with less standardized tests, for good reasons.

Standardised testing is, to put it mildly, unrealistic and potentially destructive to one’s education. Suppose a child around the age of 12, with a certain gift for mathematics, got a C for his or her language subject (Malay, English, or Chinese or Tamil). Note that his/her mastery of the language has, for the most part, nothing to do with and provide no indication – let alone a judgment – of his or her mathematical gifts, but the child would be penalised for not excelling at the language subject. Since he/she has a C in the result slip, the child would be missing out on the elite schools, which normally requires something close to a straight A’s as an enrolment prerequisite.

This mechanism continues down the line to SPM, which is probably the most important standardised test in a Malaysian student’s life. Scholarships and university placings are routinely awarded to the students with the most A’s. We always think that more is better. More A’s, more outstanding.

In consequence, students are expected to perform on all the subjects if they are to be considered excellent enough for a scholarship or entry to a top university. We demand they score A’s in all nine, ten, or eleven subjects. A less than satisfactory grade in any one of those subjects is passed on as an indicator of the student’s overall ability and performance, like a coffee stain on a piece of paper.

For example, what makes us think that the 8A+ 1B+ student is somewhat lesser than the 9A+ student? Should the former’s B+ on, say, Physics, be counted against him even though he performs par-excellence on all the other subjects?

God forbids that an Einstein should be judged based on his grade for the language subject, or a Shakespeare based on his Chemistry grade. But that’s precisely what the system is doing with standardised tests. How many potential Einsteins, Shakespeares, Rumis, Socrates, or Victor Hugos have been discriminated by the system?

To consider a more extreme but no less frequent scenario, a student may have excelled in only one subject and failed the rest. Suppose a student from a not-so-privileged background has some potential in the subject of History. Given his limited resources and time, he may have been better-off just focusing on the subject of History and maximising his potential in that field. This is, after all, what he would be expected to do in tertiary education. But standardized testing not only does not allow for such specialisation, it penalises students for being specialists. I have had friends who failed (only) one of their STPM subjects and for that reason alone, they do not fulfil the necessary minimum requirements to enter the universities and have to repeat the pre-university education (I could never understand why we have a pre-university gap year between post-SPM and university enrolment. It’s a waste of time and resources. Students should be able to apply to universities right after their secondary school, like in the United States. It seems to me that the only good reason for a gap year is for those private colleges to make money. But that’s for another article).

Also, notice that standardised tests are testing your exam skills and ability to obey instructions as much as testing your knowledge of the subject. Now suppose that I am taking the SPM English examination. The essay question is “What are the ways to reduce pollution?” On finding the topic too easy, boring, or/and not worth writing about, I proceed to write a treatise concerning human understanding and the materialist conception of history. Now surely, the system will penalize and probably give me a C for not following exam instruction because I wrote an unrelated topic. But realise this, the C which I received for my SPM English is not an indicator of my mastery of the English language, but rather, me failing to follow instruction. For all we know, the essay I wrote might be an equivalent to David Hume or George Orwell!

Or consider the subject of history. Upon receiving the SPM History exam paper, I notice that the essay question is biased. It says, for example, “Describe how the Alliance achieves independence for Malaya”. I choose to write about a variety of factors which led to independence, such as the crippling state of post-war British economy, the decline of colonialism, and the pressure of communist and leftist parties. But I would only be given points based on whatever that is on the answer scheme (skema jawapan). Even though my answers may be historically true and my interpretations academically insightful, I will be graded mainly on the basis of whether my answers contain the “facts” on the textbook (It’s no wonder that the subject of History has been reduced to a mere collection of memorised facts). Thus, SPM History is not testing my knowledge of history alone. It is also testing whether I am capable of accepting, memorizing, and reproducing trivia from the standard textbook.

On a slightly different note, a one-off standardised test is a peculiar way of measuring one’s knowledge and abilities. Imagine a student who is not feeling very well, but not to the point of being diagnosed with a sickness that would allow for him or her to retake the test on another occasion. Or if the student is panic-stricken or suffers some misfortune which negatively affects his or her emotions and focus on that day. The student’s years of effort and unfulfilled potential is undone by performing poorly on the one-off test.

To return, what sparked this article was a conversation with a friend. At the university level, we do not expect an Economics student to be well-versed in Molecular Biology or American Literature, nor an Engineering student to be equally competent in Philosophy or Law. If we don’t expect this on university level, why do we demand this of everyone at the school level?

It is absurd to demand everybody to be all-rounders. Not many can and have the resources to excel in all the subjects. Many are simply better-off by specializing in a few subjects or activities in which they are passionate about or gifted at. Whenever we look at the many “failed” students in our education system, we may want to ponder whether the system failed them as much too.

 Is standardised test training the students to think and reward them for doing so? Does it instil a love for knowledge, learning, and wisdom? Is it shaping our kids to be model citizens and equipping them with the necessary tools to deal with the challenges of the next decades? When we think about the potential of our students, the rich variety of knowledge, and the nature of education, we should question whether standardised test is still relevant as an instrument of measurement for these three things. Not everything should be standardised or tested, let alone “standardisedly” tested. – June 6, 2015. 

 * This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insider.