The plan by the President Ma Ying-jeou's Chinese Nationalist Party government to replace the national examination system for senior high schools vocational schools with a new "examination-free admission system" threatens to breed even more social inequity and could throw the doors to Taiwan's secondary education to a flood of students from the People's Republic of China.
In June 2009, the Ministry of Education released a set of "Draft Guidelines for Exam-free Admission to Senior and Vocational High Schools and Junior Colleges" that announced its intention to phase out the current system of deciding admission primarily through distribution based on joint national examinations taken in the last year of junior high schools in favor of "examination free" admission.
The program would permit certain junior high school students to be admitted to senior or vocational high schools and junior colleges through one of three exam-free methods, namely recommendation by his or her school, a direct application by the student or district registration, with the intent of permitting five to 20 percent exam-free admissions in the 2010-2011 academic year and reducing the number of joint entrance examinations from two to only one annually to be held in every June.
The ostensible goal is to cure the ills of the current system of determining admission into senior high schools, vocational schools and community colleges through national joint examinations, a system which is notorious for encouraging rote memorization and attendance at cram schools.
However, the fundamental problem with this notorious system lies less in the system of national examinations itself but in the content of such tests which put stress on providing "correct" answers derived from a narrow range of textbooks.
The MOE has now decided to gradually dispense with the former system and use "examination free admission" options as the rule and use the national examinations as a supplemental procedure to be administered only once annually in June instead of semiannually.
The MOE plans to expand implementation of the new examination - free admission system for secondary schools throughout Taiwan beginning in the 2012 academic year, but the biggest obstacle to this sanguine timetable is the lack of a firm decision on what types of measurements of student achievement or ability will replace the current examination system.
In this light, the MOE's announcement sparked intense concern among junior high school teachers, parents and students, especially since the MOE had neglected to carry out sufficient dialogue or, as Ma would say, "guidance," with the National Teachers Association or other social or educational reform groups or parent - teacher organizations.
Last week, the NTA announced its selection of the MOE's decision to implement this "crude and hasty plan" as one of the top 10 education stories of 2009.
Cure worse than disease
The biggest problem lies in the fact that most junior high schools are responding to the need to have an objective basis to recommend students by deciding on a new and even more flawed and inequitable measurement system, namely school rankings of students based on the averages of their quantitative grades in the 18 examinations taken by all junior high school students at the beginning, middle and end of each of six semesters during their three years.
This system will actually put even more intense and constant mental pressure on students and their parents than the much maligned national joint examination system as every student will be under pressure to score high marks on each and every of these 18 examinations instead of being able to secure admission to a senior high school or vocational school through a good showing on the national examinations during their senior year in junior high school.
In addition, the adoption of this new system will make it even more unlikely that students will have any opportunity to manifest creativity or experiment or even the flexibility to read books outside of the assigned material.
Even more worrisome is the fact that the elimination of flexibility will exact the heaviest prices on students from working class or poor families who have to work to supplement family incomes or who have no funds for bribes to teachers to secure good grades in the junior high school examinations and who will be deprived of the chance to make up for these disadvantages with a strong national test scores.
Another concern with the "examination free admission" plan concerns the possibility that the system could be paving the way for the entry of Chinese students into Taiwan schools by dropping the requirement of passage through the Taiwan national joint examinations and thus gain access to education in Taiwan and even employment opportunities through "recommendation" from their home schools in the PRC.
Like all too many policies designed in the "black box" of the Ma administration, the MOE's "exam-free admission program" fails to address core issues and threatens to generate bigger nightmares for Taiwan students, parents and teachers and foster greater social inequities unless it is promptly returned to the proverbial drawing board for a substantive and comprehensive re-examination and careful design.
Source: Taiwan News Online - Editorial 2010/01/13
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