Essay Sample on Modern School Exams: A Burden or Benefit?

Introduction

Modern school examinations have been the whole mark of learning for the longest time in the history of education. Many students have undergone extensive and tiresome hours of sleepless nights of memorizing and preparation. Many examinations around the world are tailored to make the students reproduce material learned in class. Although at times the assist students to pass to the next level, most of the time they are designed to prevent students from progressing and often capitalize on their inability to remember. Schools should eliminate examinations because they defeat the entire notion of education as a tool for learning and the purpose of scholarship and the application of examinations to real life.

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First, examinations fail to define the students' skills and capabilities. According to Vavrek (2016), the education system loses too many talented people by defining success through the virtue of passing examinations. The problem in education lies with the very definition of the word 'intelligence'. The mutual meaning of the word is defined to mean possessing an affinity to quick understanding and application of the knowledge acquired to a higher level. Therefore, examinations fail to measure divergent thinking and creativity because they must be marked as the primary objective for setting the exams and therefore they are inadequate.

Second, although students have different abilities, learning capabilities and talents, examinations fail to differentiate the skills and aptitudes between students and hence subject all of them to similar standards which are inaccurate. Qudsyia & Putri, (2016) posit that performance in examinations entails more than the student's preparation. It takes the student's social, mental, and physical situation. Since studies are timed events, developing diarrhea in the course of sitting a test may lead to total disqualification or a re-sit of the examination at worst. Such a factor can end up determining the success of the students in the exams no matter how intelligent they are. Moreover, some instances that may occur during the examination period may determine the success of the student, and it would not matter how hard the students prepared for the examination.

Third, the presence of cheating among students means that examinations can never be an accurate apparatus for measuring performance because students will always cheat their ways to high grades. According to Qudsyia & Putri, (2016) examination cheating has watered down the substance of the examination and the education system at large and enables low performing students to get away with high grades. Therefore, this makes it impossible to properly measure their performance. Cheating accrues from fear of failure and the anxiety of having to be locked out of an opportunity like promotion to the next class or qualification for a scholarship.

Conclusion

Overall, schools should eliminate examinations because they defeat the entire notion of education as a tool for learning and the purpose of scholarship and how this can be applied to real life. The failure of the examination system to identify and nurture talent calls to question to question the entire role of education in improving lives. Whereas proper education system should enlighten people, sensitize them and eliminate illiteracy, a failed education system promotes rote learning in which students emerge as mere agents of reproducing content acquired in class with zero ability to apply such knowledge in their everyday lives. Schools must, therefore, abolish examinations because as opposed to promoting and nurturing education and learning, they are the main obstacles to learning.

References

Qudsyia, H., & Putri, M. (2016). Self-efficacy and Anxiety of National Examination among High School Students. Social and Behavioral Sciences, 217(1), 268-275. doi: 10.1016/j.sbspro.2016.02.082

Vavrek, R. (2016). External Part of School Leaving Examination and its Statistical Analysis in Selected Region. Procedia Economics and Finance, 39(1), 534-538. doi.org/10.1016/S2212-5671(16)30296-9