The collapse of the principles of the Unified State Examination of schools

Having barely begun, the 2013 certification period clearly demonstrated that the school reform, the culmination of which was the introduction of the Unified State Exam, was at a dead end.

Ten years ago, our graduates, having been subjected to an experiment for the first time, wrote a test Unified State Examination in mathematics. It was also possible to get a “D” on the exam - the annual mark was included in the certificate. The introduction of a new form of assessing the results of secondary education then caused not only anxiety, but also hope. I admit that at first I was a supporter of this idea, considering the arguments of the reformers convincing.

Let me remind you of the key ones:

1) The Unified State Exam eliminates corruption in admissions to universities;

2) will put applicants on equal terms and give talented children from the provinces a chance to enter prestigious educational institutions;

3) in comparison with the situation when graduates had to take exams twice (first at school, then at university), it will create gentle conditions for children and will have less impact on their psyche and health;

4) will become a tool for improving the quality of school education.

For five years now, the Unified State Examination has been conducted as usual throughout the country; it’s time to get used to it and eliminate all the shortcomings. But, alas, each time the Unified State Exam discredits itself more and more. During the 2013 campaign, it became finally clear that none of the previously stated goals were achieved.

The Unified Exam is constantly rocked by corruption scandals. The talk of the town has become the situation in which students from the Caucasian republics score on average the highest scores in the Russian language. Judging by media information, there are many places in Russia where good results are bought for a certain bribe. Knowing and loving our native state, we could still reconcile ourselves and suppress our indignation at these phenomena.

But I don’t have censorship words to describe the fact that Teacher’s Newspaper reported on May 28 - “a few days before the Unified State Examination in history, biology, computer science, mathematics, social studies and chemistry, all exam tasks in these subjects were found in the public domain.” . The American anonymous file-sharing server http://anonymousdelivers.us contains archives where assignments for each subject are grouped into four zones: “Far East”, “Siberia”, “Urals” and “Centre”. You can buy it for 3000 rubles, there are real task catalogs.

This is actually a condemnation of society, which supposedly does so much to preserve the moral character of young people, but in the realities of this cynical sale, the entire price of the anti-corruption election campaign and pretentious patriotic speeches.

However, there was no need to talk about equal conditions for graduates before. In fact, the country has a situation with the presence of “good” and “bad” schools, whose personnel, material and other resources are not comparable. Over the past decade, educational leaders have watched with complete indifference the degradation of the mass school system. When directors of rural or even district schools and directors of gymnasiums (lyceums) talk, it very soon becomes clear to them that there are practically no similar problems with the management of their institutions.

Unequal conditions during training are reinforced by unequal conditions for graduates when organizing the exam itself. From many rural schools, Unified State Examination points are located tens of kilometers away. The child needs to get up unusually early, get tired on the road, pray for transport, find himself in someone else’s walls, so that he sits down for the exam in far from the best condition.

The biggest questions are related to the problem of maintaining the health of schoolchildren. Only the lazy don’t talk about health-saving technologies in school today. And what an unprecedented falsehood such conversations smack of when they end at the Unified State Exam! Are we preserving the health of the future of the nation only to destroy it at the end of the 11th grade? Where are the studies about the stress children experience during a ten-day wait, when the outcome of their entire school life, receiving a certificate, and their entire fate depends on the encrypted piece of paper they fill out in a few hours? How does the understanding that honesty and conscientiousness of studying for eleven years affect their mental and moral health are easily crossed out by the Unified State Examination, which allows any fraud?

What is the quality of education here, if from year to year you can see examples of how a lazy person and an ignoramus can easily get a free place at the university, taking it instead of a smart and diligent one?

And at the same time, thousands of schoolchildren (who do not dream of higher education at all, but simply want to live and work happily) without passing the mandatory Unified State Examination, without cheating, without giving a bribe, are thrown to the margins of life. And the head of government D.A. Medvedev agreed to add a few dozen more students to them, calling for the cancellation of the work of those who posted their CMMs on the Internet. Despite the fact that they have mastered the school curriculum! Nonsense, no words. You will fine them, but deprive them of their certificate?! Are these unfortunate children to blame for the wretchedness of the state exam, when it depends on their pranks that the results of the Unified State Exam as a whole can be called into question?