June is final exam month at Polytechnic. Because the African system is so different than the US system, I thought I'd share a bit about how Namibian final exams work.
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For starters, at University of Nebraska all students take 'final exams' during one "Finals Week" at the immediate end of each semester. Some instructors choose to make the "final" a comprehensive exam. Others choose to make it a regular test that covers the last unit of the semester.
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At Polytechnic, the system works quite differently. Students can only take the final exam if they have over a 50% average on the rest of the tests and assignments during the semester. While that sounds fairly benign, grading scale is different here, and it is not unusual to have up to 1/4th of the class not qualify for the final exam. If you don't qualify, you have to take the course over the next year.
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Students also have to pay to take final exams. Some students have spent all their money on tuition and food, so they elect to skip the final exam immediately after the semester, and they take the exam during the next exam period in about 5-6 months (after the next semester). A student who fails the final exam can also take the exam again--up to 3 more times. So, it is common to have students taking an exam for the 3rd or 4th time for a course they took two years ago. The educational ramifications of that seem a bit of a stretch to me, as the new exams might be set by new instructors who teach very differently--and the student doesn't actually take the course over...just shows up for the exam.
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Tests and exams are different in Namibia...the words are used by me to mean the same thing in Nebraska. I have a course with 3 tests or 3 exams...use whatever word you want. But, in Namibia, "tests" happen during the semester and "exams" happen at the end of the semester. I learned the hard way that students get a little freaked out when you tell them the 'exam' is next week...
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During the semester, let's say a student misses the first "test". In Nebraska, we'd make up a make-up exam if they had a good excuse (death in family or personal illness). At Polytechnic, the student just misses that test. No re-do. But, the lecturer now has to create another test for the student sometime during the semester. The rule is that each course has to have at least 2 tests during the semester. The expectation is that these are 'traditional' tests--not group project reports or other experiential learning type of assessments. So, most instructors make 3 tests for their course, so that each student has the opportunity to get 2 tests taken. Then, the third test could be optional for students if they have taken the first two. Again, from my perspective, there is a lack of connection to educational objectives--some students may not be tested over a portion of the material covered (until the Final Exam). But, it appears to be an adaptation to a system in which students sometimes have odd reasons for not being in class--like the fact that their transportation from their home 8 hours away didn't materialize for them to come back after the weekend.
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OK, so now the semester is over. Most students have taken at least two tests, they have passed the semester portion of the course, they have paid their examination fees, and the Final Exam is upon us.
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Well, actually, we have to back up about a month before the semester is over. Lecturers have to submit a 'memo' for their Final Exam to a moderator, who is an off-campus person assigned by Polytechnic to make sure the Final Exam is suitable for the course. The memo consists of the questions to be asked and ALL possible answers that will be accepted as correct. For open-ended essay questions, this can be a bit hard to think of all possible creative ways students might answer a question. And, what do you do if the final month of semester is altered and you cover different material than you previously placed on the Exam? Last, lecturers actually have to submit TWO memos--one for the current semester's exam and a "supplement"--which is the exam that will be given 6 months from now, if students elect to skip or if students fail the current exam.
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Again, at first glance, this moderator system appears to be a real educational boondoggle. The moderator never sets foot in the classroom during the semester, and they are supposed to know if the Exam is suitable? Furthermore, the moderator will look at the marked exams, after the lecturer grades it, to be certain that appropriate points were given or deducted for each question. I chuckle when I think what my colleages at UNL would do if they were told we were switching to a moderator system. "Academic freedom" is a foundation of the American system, and the notion of tenured faculty members letting someone else change their scores given to students would be enough to make some people resign on the spot.
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As with all things, it is good to look behind the system to see why it exists, however. African education, like other things in Africa, has a record of bribery and corruption. Polytechnic has tried extremely hard to make their system immune to this, but you hear of other institutions who routinely instruct their lecturers to stop taking bribes for grades. Also, there are few PhD lecturers at most institutions--making a system that provides checks and balances somewhat sensible. However, it has been hard for me to adapt to the system.
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So, now we have our Final Exam accepted by the moderator, and the Final Exam time is upon us. Rather than a week of exams, Polytechnic students have a month of exams. June and November are examination months. Lectures stop in late May and October, with about a week between the end of lectures and beginning of exams. Exams are scheduled to accomodate student and lecturer schedules. But, if a student ends up with two exams on one day, they can elect to just wait to take one of the exams 6 months later. No policy to let them take it on a different day or reschedule.
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Today, I attended the final exam for my Natural Resource Management course. I arrived at 7:30, prior to the 8:00am exam. Students were in a queue, being bodily searched by security guards to check for cell phones and other items not allowed in the exam rooms. After the security check, they presented their paperwork to show they qualified for the exam and that they had paid for it. The students entered a large hall, which was actually a parking garage at one point--cement floors and ceilings. It was well-lit, but open in several places to the outside. Today's temperatures at 8 am were probably in the high 40's or low 50's, so students took the exams bundled in coats. Exams are 3 hours long.
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All students scheduled for the same day--in many courses--take the exams together. So, our Natural Resource Management students were in one long row of chairs (front to back to prevent cheating--no side views), right next to Consumer Law and Business Communication students. This is depicted in the photo (sorry for cell phone photo) on this posting. Each student got the appropriate exam paper, and examination booklet to write their answers. They were given final instructions, and started to write. Invigilators (a new word to me--proctor is the word we use at UNL) walked the aisles to keep student eyes on their own paper. Lecturers hovered for the first hour to see if there were any questions. Three hours after it began, the students handed in their exams, which were whisked away to a secure site to be collated and bundled.
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I arrived at the examination office in the afternoon to pick up the exams to be marked. I went through 2 locked doors to get to my examination officer, who handed me my exams after I signed to show that I had picked up 21 exam papers. They also gave me the official memo, which I had helped construct a month ago, to help with my grading. Lecturers mark the exams in red. Moderators mark their comments and revisions on scores in green.
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So, maybe my UNL students will breathe a sigh of relief when they read this. I want to emphasize again that there is a reason for the really rigorous attempt to make the exam rigorous, comparable to other universities, secure, and immune from cheating. But, it is definitely a different system.
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Kelly says that the system reminds her of the examinations shown in Harry Potter, so perhaps there is a European influence (or influence of witchcraft...?!). There are movements afoot at Polytechnic to change the system to make the assessment system used directly reflects educational objectives and insure that students re-taking an exam have studied under the lecturer who wrote the exam. But, my guess is that those will be a long-time coming.
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In the meantime, I now have a new title I can add to my resume: invigilator.
1 comment:
Dang, that's an intense and very different system, and it would probably seriously screen UNL fish and wildlife majors.
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