From the story of two valedictorians failing their first choice of university that caused a stir in public opinion recently, Dr. Vu Thu Huong said that only the graduation exam results should be considered as valuable for graduation consideration. Admission to university and college must be autonomously decided by the schools.
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| Dr. Vu Thu Huong said that graduation exam scores are only for graduation consideration, while university admissions must be autonomously decided by the schools. |
Many people think that why are there so many young geniuses nowadays who failed the university entrance exam with nearly 30 points? Some people wonder if the graduation exam is too easy? What do you think about the recent public uproar over the two valedictorians failing their first choice university?
This story clearly shows that exams do not achieve the goals that were set. It has shown that there are shortcomings.
To consider this issue specifically, we need to go back to the story of combining two exams into one starting in 2016. At that time, many experts spoke out against the mechanical combination of two high school graduation exams and university entrance exams into one. Two exams with two opposing goals being mechanically combined will have problems and shortcomings.
However, everything still happened. In the following years, the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) continuously sought ways to improve the quality of the exams.
In addition, universities also see instability when accepting students who pass their wishes based on the 2-in-1 exam. They are more flexible and autonomous in recruiting to be able to find students who meet their requirements.
Since then, many university admission methods have been born. The Ministry of Education and Training agreed with those admission methods along with the results of the 2-in-1 exam. Therefore, strange stories such as the valedictorian still failing the first university choice as above appeared.
In fact, in recent years, many candidates with high scores in the high school graduation exam still failed their first choice, or even failed university. Is it unreasonable to use high school graduation exam scores for university admission?
This incongruity has existed since the 2-in-1 exam began. The reason is that the goals of the 2 exams are completely different.
The high school graduation exam is a re-examination of all the knowledge that students have been provided with for 12 years. Therefore, the exam is required to be broad enough but only at a basic level to be able to test easily. The exam score can be high, even very high and the number of students passing this exam is usually at 80 - 90% or more.
Meanwhile, the university entrance exam is a talent selection exam, “panning for gold”. Therefore, the passing rate will not be high, depending on the competition rate of each school.
When mechanically paired together, there will certainly be students who get very high scores (because they study hard to achieve high school graduation goals) but are not really good according to the selection criteria of universities. There will also be students who are really good (according to the selection criteria of universities) but do not have good results in this 2-in-1 exam. Therefore, there will be valedictorians who fail the university entrance exam and students with lower scores who pass.
Nowadays, many schools have used admission methods, no longer using many criteria for admission methods based on high school graduation exam scores. So does that mean that the graduation exam is no longer meaningful?
As mentioned above, when combining the two exams and accepting other admission methods, the graduation exam really no longer has much value. Currently, we only see that the exam still has enough value in testing general knowledge, also known as high school graduation. The value of university and college admissions has almost disappeared.
More than 10 years ago, public opinion raised the question of whether or not to organize the high school graduation exam when nearly 99% of candidates passed? There were also opinions that the graduation exam should be handed over to the localities, and university admissions should be returned to the autonomy of the schools. What do you personally think?
The high school graduation exam, even though it has a pass rate of nearly 99%, is still necessary because it is intended to test knowledge. It can be said that this exam is similar to a normal semester exam but at a more general level for 12 years of studying. If this exam is eliminated, the quality of students' learning and training will decrease.
In 2016 and 2017, when the Ministry of Education and Training announced that the graduation exams would only include Math, Literature, and Foreign Languages, the phenomenon of university and college students entering those years having very serious knowledge gaps was evident. Studying for exams is still a reality, especially when parents' achievement problems have not decreased.
Therefore, I think the Ministry of Education and Training should invest all its efforts in the high school graduation exam, and invest its efforts to find suitable implementation methods. How many subjects to take, how to take the exam, and how to avoid negative aspects of this exam are challenges for the Ministry.
In many countries around the world, the high school graduation exam lasts for the entire time students are in this level of education. Students can complete some subjects and take the exam to get their scores from the 10th and 11th grades.
For example, if a student concentrates on accumulating all 12 years of History knowledge right from grade 10, he/she will be given the opportunity to take the high school graduation exam in History during the summer semester at the end of grade 10. At that time, in grades 11 and 12, that student will not have to worry about studying and taking the History exam anymore. They will have time for other subjects. Therefore, the pressure of exams will be reduced.
So, in my opinion, with university and college entrance exams, the Ministry of Education and Training should let schools be autonomous in organizing their own exams, as long as it is reasonable and does not allow any negative things to happen. This will also demonstrate the autonomy of each school.
The Ministry of Education and Training should set regulations and standards for those separate exams to ensure quality and avoid negativity. If the exams are self-managed and autonomous by the schools, the Ministry sets regulations and has inspection teams to check each school, the problems with the exams will be minimized.
How do we need to improve, how do we need to return the graduation exam to its true nature?
In my opinion, we should only consider the graduation exam results as valuable for graduation. Admission to universities and colleges must be autonomously decided by the schools.
Each school will take care of its own admission process with its own appropriate criteria. The Ministry of Education and Training will issue regulations to ensure reasonable and non-negative admissions.
Thank you Dr.!
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