(VII) APPENDIX G MEMORANDUM ON ITEM 10 : REFORM IN EXAMINATION SYSTEM
One of the sources of corruption and evils arising in higher education is too much concentration on university examinations and whatever politics one comes across in Indian universities is all due to the present examination system. Those who wield power in universities can distribute favours in the form of examinerships, tabulatorships, prescribing books for different examinations and so on. There is a scramble for power in university bodies because that enables one to gain power, prestige and money. Since the whole education is examination-centred, the teacher's instruction and .the studies are directed solely towards success in the examination. The plethora of short notes, question-answers, subjects made easy, which are poisoning the whole academic atmosphere of this country is a proof that passing an examination has been reduced to a technique which has no relation with the knowledge of the subject. If a survey is made our educationists will be simply astounded to know that the publishers of short notes, question-answers, made easy and guess papers are simply minting money and the authors and publishers of standard works of different subjects are facing bankruptcy. Unless we reform our examination system no expenditure and no efforts will be of any help in improving the academic standards in our colleges and universities. This is why universities should be bold enough to gradually assess the worth of the candidates by accepting sessional marks given by the teachers of the students. There are certain dangers of this system as well because unfortunately in our universities and colleges we have not been in a position to attain that high academic integrity which one should expect of university and college teachers but this method can be introduced under proper safeguards and checks.
(A supplementary memorandum on the subject follows.)
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SUPPLEMENTARY MEMORANDUM ITEM 10 : Reform in examination system
(Prepared by the Directorate of
Extension Programmes for Secondary Education)
The Need for Reform The system of examinations at all levels of education has been the subjects of criticism for several decades. Many of the defects from which our education suffers have been attributed to the unsatisfactory system of examinations. The main defects are:
(1) The lack of comprehensiveness, for examinations do not cover the whole syllabus and do not assess the pupil's total achievement.
(2) The low level of objectivity and reliability.
(3) The lack of awareness among the pupils and teachers alike, of the wider purposes of learning other than mere acquisition of information.
These shortcomings and defects of the examination system have been emphasised repeatedly by several conferences and commissions including the Secondary Education Commission (1953) and subsequently by the Bhopal Seminar on Examinations (1956). In order to remedy these defects the Ministry of Education and the former All-India Council for Secondary Education initiated a scheme of examination reform.
Programme of the Examination Reform On the basis of the study of the prevalent examination system made by Dr. B. S. Bloom of Chicago, a ten-year programme of examination reform was formulated, the implementation of which began in 1958 with the establishment of the Central Examination Unit in the former All-India Council for Secondary Education, (now D.E.P.S.E.). This programme envisaged the following steps:
(i) Significant and realistic purposes of learning should be set before the teacher and the pupil.
(ii) Teachers should be prepared through in-service or pre-service training to implement these purposes.
(iii) Internal and external evaluation procedures to serve these purposes should be developed.
(iv) Additional objectives would be gradually developed and accepted for purposes of learning, incorporated into the class-rooms procedures and examinations.
(v) An examination unit should be established at the Centre to give effective leadership in the development of suitable examination procedures.
(vi) Work with teachers should be organised in their respective subject-fields through workshops and seminars to help them clarify one or two major purposes of learning.
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(vii) A large pool of test material should be produced which would validly measure the student's attainments: with reference to these purposes.
(viii) This material would be made available to the secondary education boards for purposes of testing and would be gradually incorporated in the external examinations.
(ix) The material not utilized by the boards should be turned into standard tests which would be given to teachers for internal assessment and instructional purposes.
(x) Literature should be prepared to help the teachers understand and apply the new procedures more effectively.
(xi) Teachers would be helped to find method of organising learning experiences, that is materials, methods and techniques for bringing about these responses in students as are specified by the objectives. The development of appropriate learning experiences is a slower and more difficult process requiring new skills in the teachers, new material in the classroom and different attitude to learning on the part of the student.
(xii) This would and should, in logical sequence, lead to an amplification of the syllabi so as to provide clear directions to the teacher to, relate the learning experiences and evaluation instruments to specific criteria.
It would be seen from the above that the programme of reform not only aims at improving the procedures of examination and evaluation, but is directed with equal if not greater emphasis at the improvement of classroom teaching without which no reform in examination would be meaningful. The reform, therefore, is extensive in scope, its success depending upon involvement of the following agencies at appropriate stages:
(1) State Departments of Education including Inspectorate
(2) State Boards of Secondary Education
(3) Training Colleges and University Departments of Education
(4) Secondary School Teachers
(5) State, Evaluation Units and Research Bureaux
Progress Made so far During the three years since its establishment, the Central Examination Unit has accomplished the following parts of the large- scale programme of examination reform :
1. Two objectives of teaching have been selected for the first phase of work; these are: knowledge and application of knowledge for subjects, such as mathematics, science, social studies and geography, and comprehension and expression in languages.
2. Orientation workshops have been held in order to acquaint a large cross-section of secondary school teachers with the new concept of evaluation. Over 200 such workshops involving about 7,000 teachers have been organised so far in the various States.
3. State-level and advanced level workshops have also been held in which selected secondary school teachers participated with a
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specific purpose of preparing pools of test items on the two objectives specified above. About ninety workshops of these types have been held involving more than 1,500 selected teachers.
4. As a result of these workshops, a large pool of test material was collected. Some of this material was screened, tried out and subjected to process of item analysis. Out of this process has emerged a pool of about 1,000 illustrative test items, which are being printed for being supplied to the various Boards. It is expected that these items will be used by the Boards to prepare the schools and teachers for the new type of teaching and testing.
5. A number of brochures, articles and digests on evaluation have been brought out and distributed to the various agencies concerned in order to make them familiar with the concept and technique of evaluation.
6. Recognising the key position which the training colleges occupies in any scheme of educational reform, the Central Examination Unit has given a place of high priority to involve the training colleges in the programme of examination reform. Accordingly, over one third of the training colleges in the country have been introduced to the new approach through extensive and intensive work. It is hoped that in the course of the next year or two it would be possible to introduce the new concept of evaluation in the B. Ed. curriculum.
7. The first phase of the examination reform which has just been completed has brought up the need for studies and investigations into certain problems related to the reform, which should be taken up by the training colleges and progressive schools in order to evolve improved techniques in the next phases. Seminars have, therefore, been organised involving lecturers of training colleges, staff of the extension services departments and teachers of progressive schools to locate problems which call for research studies and to work out research designs.
8. Since the State boards of secondary education are vital centres for effective examination reform in the States, their co-operation and support have been enlisted through regular conferences, where the progress made from year to year is reviewed and measures for the future are planned. These conferences have been extremely valuable in making periodic assessment of the work completed and focussing attention on the immediate targets.
9. A reform of this magnitude ultimately depends for its success on the State level agencies which will take up the reform and implement it in every school in the State, modified and adapted where necessary to suit local conditions. The programme, therefore, envisages the establishment of evaluation units in every State for carrying out the reform at the State level. Since this requires training of the requisite personnel to man these units, it was decided to organise training course for State personnel. The first course of the kind was held in September-October
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1960, when 26 officers from the various States were trained in the new concept. Intensive work has also been carried out with selected schools in different regions to try out various aspects of the examination reform.
10. A major aspect of the reform is to re-emphasise the external examination and to give weightage to the pupils performance throughout his school-career. This involves the introduction of a system of internal assessment. Following the recommendations of the Bhopal Seminar and subsequent conferences, some of the Boards have been introducing internal assessment as Part of their examination system and certain problems had been located in this measure. The Examination Unit has been making a study of the working of this system.
The work completed so far has enlisted a great deal of interest among teachers and educationists in the reform. It has also enlisted the co-operation of teachers, schools and training colleges. Some of the States have already taken steps to establish the State Evaluation Units.
Future Plan It is proposed to accomplish the following targets during the Third Five-Year Plan :
(1) More objectives of teaching the various subjects of the secondary school curriculum will be selected and test pools will be constructed.
(2) Learning experiences will be developed to improve the teaching methods.
(3) A larger body of secondary school teachers will be introduced to the new reform through more workshops.
(4) The new form of testing will be introduced in the external examination in a phased manner so that at the end of the Plan period the examination questions will become objective-based (and not objective type only).
(5) All training colleges will be introduced to the new concept of evaluation so as to enable them to introduce the concept both at the pre-and in-service levels.
(6) The syllabi will be so amplified as to provide clear directions to the teachers in developing learning experiences and evaluation tools.
(7) More literature will be brought out on various aspects of evaluation techniques for the use of teachers.
(8) Research studies and investigations will be taken up Oil various problems related to examination reform.
(9) Advisory and consultative service will be provided to State boards, State departments of education, State evaluation units and individual institutions.
(10) A programme of standardising achievement and aptitude tests will be taken up to support and strengthen internal assessment
(11) More training courses will be organized for preparing State personnel.
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12) Steps will be taken to introduce internal assessment on a graded basis as part of the total assessment of pupils.
It is also proposed to try out a process of total internal assessment in few selected schools.
The Central Advisory Board of Education may consider the total programme of examination reform as outlined above and consider the following steps to be taken by the respective agencies, in the successful implementation of the reform :
(1) State departments of education may take immediate steps to establish the State evaluation units for promoting the reform and provide facilities and resources for their effective functioning.
(2) State Departments may also provide necessary leadership in other supporting aspects of the reform, such as the revision of the curricula in accordance with the new concept of teaching and testing improved procedures of teaching, preparation of suitable textbooks etc.
(3) The State boards of education may take up the implementation of examination reform in active manner and set up the necessary machinery to cope with the demands of the reform and see that the external examination introduces the new type of tests in a phased manner completing the process by the end of the Third Five-Year Plan.
(4) State departments and State boards may consider the feasibility of releasing a few selected schools in their areas from external examination so as to develop methods and materials for introducing total internal assessment.
(5) Universities and faculties of education may take early steps to incorporate the concept and techniques of evaluation in the B.T. and B.Ed. syllabus not later than the final examination of March 1963. This will enable the training colleges. and university departments of education to prepare teachers initiated in the practical implications of the reform.
(6) In a growing democracy the purposes of secondary education cannot be expected to remain static for long. As the work on learning experiences is developed and curricular revisions are initiated, new educational purposes are bound to emerge. These are too important to be left to chance. It will, therefore, be necessary to set up a national committee on educational objective, consisting of a small group of competent educationists to work out the implications of changes in the society for secondary schools, implications of the basic value and Philosophy of the nation and the nature of learning process and its implications for the schools.
(7) A suitable high power committee may be set up at the State level for coordinating the various steps of examination reform and for effective implementation and appraisal of the new measure from stage to stage.