After the achievement results… Why do we test the student with what we did not teach him?

Tweet by Ibrahim Al-Tasan

Last week, the results of the achievement test appeared, and with them began the story that is repeated every year; Joy here, shock there, and dreams that change in a few minutes.

But the question that has not changed for years is not: How much did the student earn? Rather: Did we do justice to him at all?

After more than two decades of aptitude and achievement tests, have educational authorities ever stopped to ask: What has changed in the level of results? Was all this anxiety and effort reflected in the students’ performance? Have real support programs been built within schools, or do we still leave the student to fight his battle alone, and then hold him accountable for the outcome of a battle in which we did not participate?

The student spends twelve years inside the school, adheres to the curriculum, does the assignments, passes the tests, and obtains a high school diploma. Then, the moment he knocks on the university’s door, he is told indirectly: What you have learned throughout these years is not enough, and you must now take another test that determines your future.

Here lies the problem!

I am not in favor of belittling the value of achievement or abilities, nor am I in favor of accusing the school of giving grades it does not deserve or that high school has lost its credibility. This easy explanation does not solve the problem, but rather escapes it.

The real question is: If these tests are the most important criteria for university admission, why don’t they become part of the curriculum? Why doesn’t the student learn these skills in the classroom, at the hands of his teacher, and within his school day, instead of having to search for private courses, commercial platforms, trainers, and individual experiences that vary according to the family’s financial capacity?

How do we demand that a student perform outstandingly on a test whose mechanics he did not learn in school? How do we make his future linked to measuring skills that were not an obvious part of his educational journey?

What is painful is that many students feel that high school is one way, achievement is another way, and abilities are a third way, and that they have to live through three educational systems, not one system. This alone is enough to make the anxiety greater than the learning itself.

If universities believe that achievement and abilities measure skills that schools do not measure, then this is not the student’s problem; it is an issue that must be addressed by educational policies. If the school is able to prepare the student for them, why has this preparation not been achieved systematically yet?

We don’t need more testing, we need more consistency.

We want a school that leads to the university, not a school that ends at its gate. We want the student to feel that everything he studies in the classroom brings him closer to his future, not for him to discover after graduation that there is another exam from which everything begins.

Only then, the question will not be: How much did I get in my academic achievement?

The most important question will be: What did you learn throughout your educational journey?