Graduation Tests and Politics

Who could expect that the start of school graduation tests would agitate the country so much? This is the first time school-leavers Ukraine-wide are taking external tests instead of graduation exams. On April 22, when they took the Ukrainian Language and Literature test, everyone was anxious and nervous – students, their parents and teachers, concerned authorities and organizations, and even those who had no relation to it. There is nothing unusual about anxiety and agitation at schools before such important events, but the political hullabaloo about it was quite surprising. Instead of encouraging words and wishes of good luck in the first serious test in their life, half a million school students and their parents heard the Prime Minister say that their rights were “violated.” They were especially worried by her announcement of an extraordinary Cabinet meeting, fearing that the tests would be canceled. On the next day Tymoshenko said that she was “misunderstood”: the government never meant to cancel independent external tests – it was only going to find out whether the rights of school-leavers and would-be students of universities and colleges were violated. Thank Goodness, they had learned to turn a deaf ear to politics and did not panic.

The new generation chooses tests. 90 percent of final-grade school students admitted to external tests took the Ukrainian Language and Literature test on April 22. Results are expected on May 30. On April 29 they are scheduled to take a test in Math and on May 7 – in Ukrainian History. This year young Ukrainians will be admitted to institutions of higher education on general equal terms – not all, of course, but it will be a competition of graduation certificates, not “fat wallets.” Now many parents at least have hope that their bright and diligent children will make their way with their own knowledge and that they will not have to sell half their property to pay for higher education.

Besides its anti-corruption effect and the factor of equal access to higher education, independent external testing (IET) is also important because its results demonstrate the actual level of school-leavers’ knowledge.

Most media reports, publications, and comments on IET have a certain negative bias: their authors and especially politicians play up drawbacks and find every fault they can with this entirely new national practice. Now, if they are so concerned about it, why were they silent before? Where have they been for the last two years? The transition from traditional graduation exams to IET was gradual. First there were pilot projects in which the new testing model was “run in.” Besides, it took some time to build appropriate regulatory frameworks and a solid material basis. Last year external tests were taken by 120,000 school-leavers and nobody made a big deal about it. And now, when IET was introduced Ukraine-wide to put all school-leavers on par, “champions of children’s rights” appeared out of the blue to protest against this “total experiment on children.” Whose children are they so concerned about? MP Dmytro Tabachnyk of the Regions Party, vice premier for humanitarian affairs in the previous government and now vice chairman of the standing committee on science and education, strongly objects to what he calls an “illegal experiment on school students” which the Science and Education Ministry started without waiting for the necessary amendments to the relevant laws. But why blame the ministry for the impotent parliament’s failure to amend those laws?

On Wednesday the Cabinet of Ministers convened for an extraordinary extended sitting to discuss IET problems. Again, what kept the government from addressing this problem before?

Nevertheless, the national IET campaign did start and the first round (under strict public control) was successful, even though some politicians tried so hard to disrupt it.

Notably, not a single question in a single test was known before the envelopes were opened. Besides, teachers note with satisfaction that during this academic year, thanks to the new knowledge evaluation system, 11th-graders spent more time learning instead of hanging out in hopes of their teachers’ indulgence or their parents’ “financial capacities.”

After the Cabinet sitting, Education and Science Minister Ivan Vakarchuk kindly answered a few questions.

What do you think of the first test? How was it organized? What drawbacks did you find?

As far as I know from official reports, independent observers (there were about six thousand of them – both Ukrainian and foreign), and public organizations (there were about eighty), the national testing session was organized very well and responsibly and proceeded properly. I would like to use this opportunity to thank the Interior Ministry, the Security Service, the Emergency Management Ministry, the Transport and Communications Ministry, the Health Ministry, the State Guard Service, the Revival Foundation, and staffers of local education departments for their cooperation. I’d like to express my special gratitude to our children who came to take their test despite deliberate attempts to disrupt it. All-in-all, 462,282 school-leavers took the test – ninety percent of those who were admitted. It was the first-ever nationwide “audit of knowledge” in the Ukrainian language and literature, and I am very glad that we managed to avoid many risks and conducted this test successfully. We are going to look into all shortcomings in order to avoid them in the future, but I can tell you that observers didn’t spot any serious irregularities.

Yet, the number of those who took the test was smaller than the 512,000 school-leavers admitted to IET.

Of course, such a large-scale event may involve different circumstances: some arrived too late or without their IDs or other necessary documents, some must have changed their career plans, and some may have been misled by those loud political statements. We should also take into account graduates of vocational schools who don’t have to take these tests to continue their courses at colleges. We will surely analyze each fact, but those who failed to turn up for IET needn’t worry: they have a chance to take their tests from June 26 to July 4.

Some politicians argued that IET would “bar graduates of previous years from higher education.” What if a person is a graduate or undergraduate of a university or college?

If someone wants to get higher education in another specialty, he certainly has to start from the first year. But if institutions of the second, third, or fourth level of accreditation have similar or related curricula or are bound by relevant agreements, then a college graduate may start a university from the second or third year and doesn’t have to take tests.

What is your opinion about complaints that the Education and Science Ministry “is illegally experimenting with graduates"?

Those who aggravate the situation with implementation of the tests have their personal political interests. Unfortunately, they have involved children in these political games.

Implementation of IET is based on the resolution of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, the Decree of the President of Ukraine, the Program of the Government’s Activities, and the Law on the 2008 State Budget that provides the funds for conducting the IET. It is now only necessary to amend the Law "On Higher Education." All necessary amendments have already been developed and discussed by the Verkhovna Rada's profile committee, and I hope that the Verkhovna Rada will adopt them in the near future.