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http://www.ednews.org/articles/in-south-korea-nation-stops-for-mega-exam.html
In South Korea, today, the entire nation stopped as almost 700,000 high school students took graduation tests. Their desire to do well has been such a promoted idea that people are even praying observantly for more than 100 days. This devotion to such a higher education should be influential throughout the world. But some view it as a waste of time. There is so much stress and anxiety there are reports every year of teenage suicides because of the importance of this test. This test can possibly affect their futures in ways no one can imagine. It determines what college you can get into and what sort of education or career you may end up with. The extremely high college entrance rate of 83% is nothing to balk at either. However, the test took 9 hours to complete, so rigor and difficulty are probably words that undermine what actually happens during the test. How does this compare to our school system? Students take tests to see if the schools are teaching the right material. We are penalized if the students can't pass tests. Yet these students spend hours and hours on their own without persuasion to study for a test that can grant them every wish they ever wanted. Importance is placed on the quality of teaching, not the quantity. They probably never test to see how teachers are teaching. CRCT and AYP is just a letter sequence to them. Yet they are ahead of us in education, with more engineers and scientists graduating from college every year. Where have we gone wrong where testing has replaced the learning environment. With all of the new funding, it is going to be a rough road for our education system. It is not a good idea to link pay to testing because it will only mean teachers teach to a test that has no meaning or relevance for kids, because NCLB says we can't hold them back even if they fail miserably. I was hired to do a job and that job was to teach students about technology, show them how math, science, history, and writing are relevant, and make connections to the real world and careers every chance to make these kids productive citizens. However, the focus is on meeting expectations set by individuals who are not even associated with education. Let them sit in my classroom for 2 weeks and see how things are. They want to make things better, make us more competitive, but we never raise the bar on ourselves, simply the students, but then allow many to pass under like limbo and skate through the system. Can we please take a page out of the South Korean handbook we missed in ours about education. It IS important, it IS relevant, and it WILL get you somewhere. The lies on TV and on the internet are not helping our case. Sorry for the rant, but it is sad to see how things have changed.
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Cory,
ReplyDeleteIt is great that South Korean's are so worried about their education that they would spend months studying for an exam. However, from what we know about one-shot testing I think it is a system that is unfair and further widens the gap between the haves and have nots. With so much emphasis on students passing this graduation exam, you can bet that teachers are under a tremendous amount of stress to have a high passing rate on the exam much like teachers stressing over AYP and CRT's in the U.S. I really don't see this system as being that different from what goes on here. It would seem that this test is really no different from our own SAT's or ACT's in predicting future college and employment opportunities. What IS different is the level of student dedication due to social pressure to become successful. This is what leads to so many engineers and technical professionals.
ct
Students from South Korea might have a desire to do well because they do not have the “things” that American students have. I wonder if American students did not have so many opportunities/things if students would take school more seriously. I also wonder how many children in Korea are not getting an education. Could it be that many of the poverty children are not even given the chance to go to school? This could change the test scores. Luckily, EVERY student in the US has to go to school even if they do not want to go. So Korea might not be as rosy as it seems on the outside.
ReplyDeleteThat would be a lot of pressure! Can all South Korean students go to school or is it also a selective process?
ReplyDeleteDoes NCLB really prevent students from being held back?
If this is true, no wonder there is apathy in our schools. They have to go, and they won't fail. I can see where there may be a root of apathy.
I do like that the South Korean form of education places a lot of the responsibility on the student. They need to be the ones studying. I doubt that they are thinking, well if I don't pass, at least my teacher will get bad reviews.
I also like the flexibility that the U.S. ed. offers. If you mess up on ACT there is always community college or other avenues. Maybe too much flexibility!
Philip
I share your frustration. As a Career and Technical teacher, like you, my job is to prepare students for a possible career while showing the relationship that classes such as math and language arts have on my subject matter and their career. Unfortunately, the emphasis on AYP takes time away from my ability to teach my own subject. Also, the more emphasis placed on the core subjects, the harder it is to get students to take my classes. Unfortunately, I am seeing more people take my computer classes because they think it will be easy instead of to learn how technology can benefit them. Instead, they find my classes often contain more rigor than many of the core subjects, so they think my classes are too hard instead of buckling down to learn the material. I, too, wish we would put more responsibility on the student.
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