Surprises in national high school exam marking

That is the story that made a strong impression on Mr. NT, a Literature teacher in Ho Chi Minh City, during his many years of marking national high school exams.

Teachers mark the 2018 national high school exam in Hung Yen province. Photo: Tue Nguyen

The supervisor's grading is too difficult, we have to change people!

According to the essay marking process, each test usually has to be marked in two independent rounds in two different examination rooms. The examiner marks the first round on an individual marking sheet, the examiner marks the second round on the test and records the score on the score sheet.

The story of the teacher mentioned above is that he graded... too hard! The first exams he graded in round 1 always had scores that were much different from those of his colleagues grading in round 2. When the scores were so different, the council had to meet again. Finally, the council chose the option of... changing the grader.

According to many teachers, grading Literature, the only essay subject in the national high school exam, is quite stressful, so many people “avoid” the task when assigned. In recent years, teachers’ enthusiasm has decreased significantly when the work is stressful but the salary is not commensurate.

In previous years, when all subjects were tested in essay format, with a large number of tests, many incidents occurred. In 2008, when inspecting the grading of exams at Ton Duc Thang University and Ha Tay Television College, the Ministry of Education and Training inspectors found that the two schools did not grade according to regulations. Accordingly, teachers graded too many tests, too quickly in a short time, and did not follow all the steps as previously prescribed by the Ministry. The Ministry inspectors forced both schools to re-grade.

The test is so dirty, the machine can't grade it!

Multiple choice test scoring depends heavily on the scoring machine. Because of the scoring machine, sometimes the test has errors that the machine cannot recognize. This will cause the candidate to lose points.

In the 2012 high school graduation exam, a candidate in Ho Chi Minh City got 2.5 points in English. After re-examination and re-grading by machine, the score remained the same. But when re-graded by hand, this candidate got 10 points. The reason was explained that the candidate's test paper was shorter than the other papers, so the machine could not recognize it!

Most errors can be corrected and rescanned on the computer after comparing with the original test. However, there are some tests that cannot be rescanned because the machine cannot recognize them. For example, the test has an error... too dirty! This error occurs when the test taker's hands are dirty and he presses his hand hard on the paper while doing the test.

The deputy head of the training department of a university in Ho Chi Minh City said that this is the reason why candidates are always advised to use 2B pencils when taking the exam because this type of pencil has the best smoothness and gloss. Experience shows that the better the pencil is, the cleaner the paper, the fewer errors when scanning.

However, sometimes the fault lies with the machine! Dr. Nguyen Duc Nghia - former Vice President of Ho Chi Minh City National University, recounted that there was a year when all the multiple choice tests put into the machine were faulty and could not be recognized. Later, the reason was determined to be that the answer sheets given to the students were too thin. The technical department had to readjust the sensitivity of the "magic eye" for grading.

Catch up with cheating on exams

There have been many cheating cases related to exam grading. The peak was the exam cheating case that occurred in 3 provinces of Ha Giang, Son La and Hoa Binh in 2018. This was the worst negative case in the history of education in the country, with more than 200 candidates having their scores changed. As a result, nearly 20 education managers, teachers and police officers were prosecuted and temporarily detained for investigation, including 3 deputy directors of the Department of Education and Training. The unimaginable thing was that there was a situation of buying and selling scores.

In 2011, there was a “handshake” to loosen the exam marking in the Mekong Delta provinces. At that time, the leaders of the Department of Education and Training of 11 provinces and cities in the Mekong Delta region met, discussed and agreed to issue separate exam marking instructions for this region in the direction of loosening. All essay exams of the two training systems of high school and continuing education have “special” exam marking instructions.

The reason for such a meeting with many departments is because at this time, the provinces do not grade the exams themselves but cross-grade them among themselves. After the meeting, a teacher felt upset and sent information to the press to speak up.

A former leader of the Ministry of Education and Training who directly handled the situation said that this was an extremely tense time. Public opinion was extremely indignant. The Ministry of Education and Training became even more tense when there was information that this "handshake" was approved by the Ministry.

Immediately after receiving the information, the then Deputy Minister of Education and Training, Professor Dr. Bui Van Ga, flew to the Mekong Delta and requested a meeting with the Directors of the Departments of Education and Training and the Vice Chairmen of the People's Committees in charge of culture and society of the relevant provinces. The provinces reported the whole story. The results showed that in these provinces, some provinces did not follow the "agreement" but still graded according to the Ministry's three rem.

Deputy Minister Bui Van Ga requested that provinces must evaluate the grading. If the exam papers are graded more “loosely” than the Ministry’s answers, they must be re-graded.

Hand over examination facilities and equipment before June 24

Mr. Mai Van Trinh, Director of the Department of Quality Management, Ministry of Education and Training, inspected the preparation for the 2019 National High School Exam in a number of provinces and cities. Mr. Trinh had some important notes for this year's exam, including the marking.

Mr. Trinh noted that the Department of Education and Training needs to equip the entire testing area, especially the multiple-choice testing area, with all facilities in accordance with regulations for universities to test. It is necessary to pay attention to equipping the multiple-choice testing computer system to ensure compliance with regulations. The handover of testing facilities and equipment to universities to perform the testing task must be completed before June 24.

For essay tests, it is necessary to completely isolate the plagiarism as well as draw lots, randomly divide the marking bags, and mark in two independent rounds. Note that at least 5% of the literature tests must be checked, in which the high-scoring tests must be selected for checking.

For multiple-choice test scoring, it is recommended to prepare facilities, all multiple-choice test scoring data is encrypted and hosted by universities. The test scoring area, test storage and archiving area must be strictly managed.

Mr. Trinh also noted that handling unusual situations in exam supervision and grading must comply with three basic principles: absolutely do not conceal information from the exam room, must inform the head of the exam site/chairman of the exam council through the supervisor, do not exceed the regulations of the regulations and put the interests of the candidates above the interests of the exam supervisor.

If the score is lower than the inspector's mark, the examiner will have to explain.

Ms. Duong Minh Phuong - Head of the Literature Group at Truong Dinh High School, Tien Giang, with 11 years of experience in marking exams, shared: “Before marking, the Literature marking council has a meeting to thoroughly understand the answers and the spirit of marking so that there is the least difference between the examiners. Usually, the meetings of other subjects are very quick, but Literature always takes the longest, due to its own characteristics. We have to come up with many directions to be able to mark both closely following the answers and being flexible. Normally, for each exam, an examiner will mark for about 5 - 7 minutes depending on whether the essay is short or long, or whether the examiner reads slowly or quickly.

According to Ms. Phuong, there are exams where the two examiners give two different scores. If the difference is less than 1 point, the two examiners will discuss to come up with an appropriate score. If the difference is more than 1 point, the opinion of the group leader and deputy group leader must be obtained. “Sometimes, there are situations where examiners are called in by inspectors to…explanation. For example, normally 25-30% of the exam papers will be graded by inspectors. If the examiner's score is lower than the inspector's score, then to avoid disadvantages for the candidate, the examiner will have to explain why the grading is so "strict". There are unusual cases such as the difference in scores being too large, then it must be brought to the voting council (from 120-130 examiners)", Ms. Minh Phuong shared.

For multiple-choice subjects, Dr. Tran Thien Luu - Head of Training Department of Ho Chi Minh City University of Transport, said that machines are the most important. Therefore, the preparation stage related to technical factors is very necessary. Mr. Luu acknowledged: “The resolution must be checked in advance, because if it does not meet the standards, the color recognition will not be complete. The marking process will go through 4 parts: scanning the test, reading the image, correcting errors and marking after submitting the answer. If the scanning of the test is not standard in resolution, the color is incorrect... then the image reading will be affected.”