The end of May has the newspapers full of announcements of centums in the 12th class exams from various schools and in numerous subjects. Year after year, the top marks in many subjects are on the upswing and the number of children achieving these top results are also exponentially increasing. The inevitable outcome is that top universities like Delhi University announce cut-off marks for certain courses at 100%! To be honest, I doubt any other university has such high cut-off marks. This is invariably followed by a furore amongst academicians and educationists and the proverbial copros hits the fan! High-achieving students are disappointed, parents are aghast and pundits wear hair shirts and predict “the end of civilization as we know it”.
The immediate question is whether children are truly better informed and educated today than their predecessors or is the awarding of high marks hiding poor quality education. A couple of generations ago, obtaining 60% marks in the Board Examinations constituted a First Class and not many managed to do so. Schools, colleges and boards took pride as to how difficult it was to score in their examination. In the 60s, for many years no one passed the Calcutta University, MS General Surgery, examination. It was easier to go to London and pass the FRCS. Over the years, the top marks at the school final examinations have slowly climbed and today a number of candidates obtain 100% or the magic ‘centum’. While it is conceivable that a candidate can achieve 100% in the Mathematics or the science subjects, it is difficult to comprehend 100% in English, Economics, Sociology, etc. It is this paradox that has led to allegations of “dumbing down” an examination or lenient marking inflating results. There is no doubt that high marks improve the marketability of a school as parents will vote with their feet and go to such schools abandoning the less successful. There are numerous factors contributing to the number of high achievers. On the one hand children are brighter; those with a clear goal in mind are dedicated and work amazingly hard to achieve these goals; special coaching enables them to crack the examination code (not by cheating but in methodology and approach) and with the advent of the internet, there is widespread availability of knowledge resource in the home.
At the same time, high-stakes examinations, excessively detailed syllabi and changes such as multiple choice questions have made examinations less academic. The introduction of the Continuous Comprehensive Evaluation (CCE) has eased the difficulty in obtaining 90% and above. The knowledge explosion in the last few decades has resulted in school children having to learn what previous generations learnt in college. The sheer quantity of knowledge to be learnt is mind-boggling. It is only natural that correction should also be less demanding. It does not mean these students are anyway inferior to their predecessors. On the other hand, the overall number of school leavers has increased exponentially with government policies to introduce school education for all children being successful and so has the number of children with 90% or more marks gone up. There has not been a concurrent increase in the number of seats in prestigious colleges and universities, resulting in immense pressure for admission in these colleges and the publication of unimaginable cut-off marks.
Allegations of undeserved scores in the examinations are not just an Indian phenomenon but a global one. In the last few years, record number of students have made straight ‘A’s in the A-Level examinations in the UK. Identifying the most able students has been difficult and a more rigorous approach by University Admission Deans has become a neccessity. The examination board has responded by initiating an A* marking to identify “the best of the best”. Universities are looking at other examination boards such as the IB to identify better candidates. Good schools need to teach beyond narrow parameters of the syllabus to imbue students with confidence (Patton) and the ability to learn life skills and problem solving. Cambridge university found that 30% of candidates with grade A failed the university entrance examination in mathematics. In the US, school boards in certain states were found to be deliberately inflating marks and resorting to underhand means to improve results. This then resulted in greater federal funding for the schools in the US.
The advent of generous marking has resulted in making all those involved in school education happy. Education ministers could point to the outcome of successful government policies; bureaucrats and administrators could claim efficient school management, teachers would get the reputation of examination wizards and parents and students would have the opportunity to get into good colleges.
Unfortunately the problem of plenty has brought in its train other unintended consequences. In a recent article Dr krishnakumar, formerly of the NCERT and now a professor in Delhi University has said “fixing cut-off marks for admission is a crude method of selecting students. Every major commission on education has said that the results of school-leaving examinations should not be used as the basis for enrollment in college”.
This is easier said than done. In India any attempt to choose candidates by any other criteria than examination results, seniority or something similar results in allegations of partiality and wrongdoing with those feeling ill-used rushing off to courts. Is there any solution to this problem? It is no doubt a Herculean task to clean the Augean stables of school education, which has been described as a sea of mediocrity with a few islands of excellence. The NCERT has already pointed out that current assessment focuses on cognitive learning outcomes and co-curricular domains are neglected.
While much focus has been laid on the increase in the number of high achievers, it has also resulted in high failure rates, increase in school drop-out rate, unhealthy competition, undue stress, nervous breakdowns and even suicides. The examination system requires systemic reforms in context of evaluation and assessment. It is necessary to lay emphasis on skill development rather than data or factual memorisation. As Odile Nicolas has pointed out, children from disadvantaged families should be pulled up to succeed, not the other way around. All this requires is a political will that has been sadly lacking as school education falls prey to parochial attitudes and fissiparous policies with no continuity year on year. The proposal to have a common school final examination across the country was a step forward but it has been quietly put to rest. It is well said that the “the road to hell is paved with good intentions.”