I like such exam

On January 29, I hung in my school a printout of Internet messages on the decision of the Council of Rectors of Moscow Universities regarding the entrance exams this year. And then he began to convince graduates of at least a chemical class to go to pass this very “terrible and terrible” exam. Finally, it can be handed over in Moscow. And you can even go to it at any universities.

And you can not take it, and you can do it without it. The November decision of the Moscow Department of Education , confirmed by the rector, turns what could become a forced test nightmare in this experiment to improve the certification system of graduates. Unfortunately, this applies only to graduates of Moscow schools.

Thus, in Moscow, we actually returned to the television surveying experiment, begun back in 1997. Then the centralized distance testing system developed intensively and could gradually obtain universal recognition as an addition to traditional entrance exams. Interestingly, its creators did not claim a monopoly. Here's what I wrote to me (e-mail) on this subject, the scientific director of the television testing project Alexander Shmelev in March 2000:

We do not consider tests the only and sufficient method of monitoring knowledge. They must be supplemented by traditional written exams with a detailed answer. But the disadvantages of the test method do not mean that they need to neglect at all (as is done at Moscow State University in most educational units). It would be reasonable to summarize test points with grades for traditional exams. This approach would not have closed the road at all to those who do not know how to quickly solve tests (except those who are not sure how much 2x2 will be). But, unfortunately, in many issues, the usual logic of "or-ora" dominates (it dominates both opponents and among supporters of the test method).

The exam is different from the tasks of "television", but its parts "B" and "C" are hardly called "traditional written exam."

Now the organizers and supporters of the exam have a unique chance to prove the advantages of the new system democratically, providing schoolchildren and admissions of university commissions - at least in Moscow - freedom of choice. Therefore, it is even a pity that the rector of Moscow State University V.A. Sadovnichy refused to count the exam results upon admission to Moscow University - it would be possible to compare students who received two systems at the first session. It is interesting that at the same time, at the Mehmat of Moscow State University (Viktor Antonovich - Professor Mehmat), testing is used at the first stage of the spring faculty Olympiad - as the stage of preliminary selection of participants - and in this form they are accepted without objection.

Apparently, to those Moscow universities where applicants will enter traditional exams this year and according to the results of the exam, it is necessary to conduct a detailed comparison of their students who received in different ways. For example, in the framework of traditional entrance exams on the basis of their own questionnaires of freshmen (by the way, in the form of tests that are true for respondents), I easily distinguish those who were trained by tutors, from those who taught chemistry mainly on their own 1 . Such studies will allow representatives of higher education to get away from emotional assessments and make a reasoned decision on the advisability of using the exam as entrance exams.

The organizers of the exam began to take into account critical comments on the content. Perhaps the long preparation of the official collection with the tasks of the Enlightenment Publishing House is related to editing the texts of tasks before publication. Last year’s collection with the tasks of 2002 (chemistry) caused many comments , so even the already published tasks of 2002 in the new collection 2 were edited again. For example, in the same Chemistry EGE set (2002), 11 out of 60 tasks were edited compared with the previous collection, and 9 tasks were completely replaced. Of course, such a thorough preparation of tasks is desirable before the examiners will receive them, and not a year and a half after the exam, but a positive trend can still be noticed. It is especially gratifying that in the published five tasks of 2003 tasks there are almost no contents errors.

It remains incomprehensible why a huge array of exam tasks is still secret. Indeed, in those schools where traditional final exams are being passed, before composing and mathematics they simply declare specific topics and options of tasks from previously published sets.

The introductory tasks for the chemical faculty of Moscow State University are regularly repeated, all of them are published, including in the form of analysis of the most difficult and often encountered , and this does not lead to high results among new generations of applicants.

A lot in the current reforms of our education is surprisingly reminiscent of what happened in the Soviet school in the 20-30s of the XX century. For example, today's “innovative” introduction of the integrated course “natural science” (an analogue of the imported “science”) to the details is similar to the “method of life complexes” on the intersubject basis of the 1925/26 sample 3 . Then he was quickly canceled (in 1931), because it became clear that the underwear that turned out to be as a result, the industrialization of the country was impossible. And sets of standardized tests to account for skills in reading, account and letter were introduced in Soviet schools also in 1925. The insufficient reliability of the then tests (by the way, like the current ones, they were very similar to the American ones) in the "totalitarian" Soviet state to the fact that all tests were prohibited at all. The case ended with the infamous decree of the Central Committee of the All -Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks of 07.07.1936 "On pedological perversions in the system of the People's Commissariat of People's Commissariats" 4 .

In recent years, we have been observing the opposite tendency - the violent implementation of what was attributed to "perversions" almost 70 years ago. Textbook stores are already littered with collections of tests and manuals to prepare for them. In fact, a return to an unsuccessful attempt to massage programmed training in the 60s-70s of the last century is planned. And it is unlikely that the results of such "innovations" will differ from the previously achieved. Therefore, it is possible that as a result of preserving not the best tradition of strict monopoly decisions in the field of education, we will get a new sharp turn in the opposite direction - as is already happening with history textbooks.

The Moscow version of the final and entrance exams in 2004 gives an experiment with the USE a new chance - the possibility of open comparison and analysis of the results from the second and higher school. The Ministry of Education should not be missed.

Notes:

1 Zagorsky V.V. The paradoxical result of the study: the quantity does not always guarantee the quality of chemistry at school, 2002, #7, p.16-19.

2 Unified State Exam: Chemistry: Control. measure. Materials. A.A. Kaverina, D.Yu. Dobropin, Yu.N. Medvedev and others - M.: Education, 2003. - 256 p.

3 Parmenov K.Ya. Chemistry as a subject in the pre -revolutionary and Soviet school - M. Publishing House of the APN RSFSR, 1963. - 359 p., P. 239.

4 Russian pedagogical encyclopedia: in 2 tt. - M.: Big Russian Encyclopedia, 1998.