Do not pressure teachers to lower standards
Veteran teacherPublished: May 27, 2009 8:21 AM | Updated: May 27, 2009 8:22 AM
When you have lost the game, it is not a new tactic to try to change the goal post. For admissions, even ivy league universities have had to do this once before -- at least for a while. The experiment did not last, however.
Faced with Chinese, Korean students aceing entrance exams such as SATs, etc, US universities at one time weighed admission criteria higher for non-academic subjects such as co-curriculum courses, especially for entry into medical courses. Another tactic is to have an interview and grade their verbal speaking ability. Even then, nothing much changed, and before long, the status quo was re-instated. Finally, it is still the best and the brightest - the fittest who excel academically - who will always prevail over all sorts of tests.
As a top school, you still need to recruit not just "jocks" or sportsmen but researchers, people who can read voraciously. At the end of the day, you will need good minds to absorb all the learning. Then there is the thinking and the problem solving. No amount of sportsmanship can raise the bar for creativity and learning, if you are not already a good scholar.
Again, here in Malaysia, we are attempting to lower the ceiling, reducing the maximum number of subjects that anyone can take, so the top scores and grades are achievable for more people from any one rather than other groups.
You are trying to engineer the tests so that the "right"people end up taking more of the top places. Without engineering, there are high achievers from every community. Please don't skew the numbers artificially.
"Engineering" the result will only increase skepticism, cynicism, and the lack of credibility of even more of our institutions, such as scholarship-awarding authorities, and education institutions.
Instead of social engineering, improve the schools. Focus on the teaching, class size, change the boring lifeless syllabus, base promotions on merit and dedication and excellence in teaching, not merely on the time you have served. Reform must be about what goes into the head, what works in the mind. Not forcing lecturers to grade to a pre-drawn normal curve; not forcing them to have fewer failures from any group.
Get real. In some things, you should not manipulate but let the grades fall where they fall. It is the students who should be pressured, not pressuring the lecturer to lower their standards.
Faced with Chinese, Korean students aceing entrance exams such as SATs, etc, US universities at one time weighed admission criteria higher for non-academic subjects such as co-curriculum courses, especially for entry into medical courses. Another tactic is to have an interview and grade their verbal speaking ability. Even then, nothing much changed, and before long, the status quo was re-instated. Finally, it is still the best and the brightest - the fittest who excel academically - who will always prevail over all sorts of tests.
As a top school, you still need to recruit not just "jocks" or sportsmen but researchers, people who can read voraciously. At the end of the day, you will need good minds to absorb all the learning. Then there is the thinking and the problem solving. No amount of sportsmanship can raise the bar for creativity and learning, if you are not already a good scholar.
Again, here in Malaysia, we are attempting to lower the ceiling, reducing the maximum number of subjects that anyone can take, so the top scores and grades are achievable for more people from any one rather than other groups.
You are trying to engineer the tests so that the "right"people end up taking more of the top places. Without engineering, there are high achievers from every community. Please don't skew the numbers artificially.
"Engineering" the result will only increase skepticism, cynicism, and the lack of credibility of even more of our institutions, such as scholarship-awarding authorities, and education institutions.
Instead of social engineering, improve the schools. Focus on the teaching, class size, change the boring lifeless syllabus, base promotions on merit and dedication and excellence in teaching, not merely on the time you have served. Reform must be about what goes into the head, what works in the mind. Not forcing lecturers to grade to a pre-drawn normal curve; not forcing them to have fewer failures from any group.
Get real. In some things, you should not manipulate but let the grades fall where they fall. It is the students who should be pressured, not pressuring the lecturer to lower their standards.
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