Authorise Teachers To Assess Students

Madhav Prasad Dahal

Teachers are supposed to better evaluate students for they are in constant touch with them in the classrooms and know about their academic performance well. So the students’ academic evaluation made by anyone else except the teachers cannot guarantee justice to them. Our assessment system seems to be flawed and has made many students’ future uncertain. They are taught by a group of teachers; but their exam takes place somewhere far outside their familiar premises; and their copies are checked by even unknown persons who know nothing about them. 

Surprisingly, the examiners do not need to be strictly accountable to the grades they encode on the students’ answer sheets. They are driven by the impulse to finish big bundles of answer sheets in a short time. As there are no rigid frames of marking grades in the copies, examiners seem to be less responsible to read students’ answers thoroughly. Though the board is there to make a crosscheck of the copies, it is too sluggish and hardly works. The lucky students get good scores no matter how they have written in the answer sheet. There are innumerable examples of good students getting low marks due to examiner’s carelessness. 

Old questions 

The examiners provide marks on the basis of answers the students write on their papers. Students’ evaluation made on the basis of their written answers may not demonstrate their merit and skills entirely. The mere focus on writing skill is too traditional and ignores students’ multiple skills. Over the last few years, the written exam module has also become controversial. Sometimes the universities assign the responsibility of setting question papers to those who have not taught the course no matter how experienced they are. There are complaints that the questions are thoroughly repeated time and again. Instead of setting new questions that demand creative answers from the students, the old questions are copied and pasted. 

Nepal government seems to distrust teachers when it comes to authorising them to evaluate their students. The central board sets the questions and controls the evaluation system all over the nation. Right from the basic level, the central authority schedules exams and runs them nationally. Question papers are set disregarding the students’ complexities. These exams rather terrorise the students psychologically. Questions sometimes appear from outside their curriculum. This humiliates the students and it may even lead them to leave school. The students have to wait for more than six months for their results. More than that, there is no transparency in checking answer sheets. The students must accept whatever marks they obtain. The lengthy process discourages them to speak against the authorities.

When we compare our evaluation system with that of advanced nations, there are remarkable differences. Iswari Pandey, Professor of California State University, USA, says, in a television interview with Janata TV (January 20, 2022) that the US government trusts its teachers and Professors as authorised persons to give final grades to their students. Professors’ remarks on students’ grade sheets are quite important there. Pandey states that as a teacher closely knows his/her students’ academic performances, no other people can evaluate them the best than the teacher. Unlike ours, there is no any central body in the USA to control evaluation system for junior classes. 

Similarly, Jib Lal Sapkota, Professor and the Head at the Central Department of English, TU, Kirtipur also states that the Professor’s remarks are the major determinants for awarding the MPhil and PhD degrees. Sapkota stresses on the need that the government should authorise respective teachers for evaluating their students in the Bachelors’ and Master’s level as well. But the teachers must stand above any political or ideological biases to do that role. Without taking teaching career as a noble profession, it is difficult to devise, implement and sustain sound academic strategy. If the respective teachers develop patterns to evaluate their students accommodating multiple of their skills, they can do justice to the students and this act ultimately sets ground for motivating students to sharpen their potential areas further, says Sapkota. 

Talking about the Japanese way of education, Nobuoko K. Shimahara explains that the Japanese model of evaluating students’ academic progress is teacher-centric. The Japanese teachers check emotional and intellectual disposition of students through different evaluation patterns. They have heavier concentration on moral and ethical aspects of students. Likewise, the Chinese education system also involves teachers in providing a genuine feedback to the delivery of students’ assessments. Gavin T. L. Brown and Lingbiao Gao describe that the Chinese teachers have control over the quality of education and what happens in school curriculum. 

Scientific strategy

Teachers must know their students very closely. They require gathering more information about them. Ann KN and Patty Hasser assert that the evaluation of students should be collected along with students’ cultural and personal backgrounds. Teachers need to teach students with care imparting in them the patriotic impulses. They must devise the scientific strategies of teaching and evaluating their students. Their test patterns must be strong and capable enough to judge students’ real potential. They should be diverse and must prepare students to work for the nation later. 

Herbert W. Marsh also claims that the evaluation questionnaire must measure multiple dimensions of teaching. But testing students’ skill by taking written tests through a set of repeated questions cannot accelerate students’ critical faculty. Educationists would need to review and modify the existing student evaluation patterns in Nepal. 

(Dahal is an Assistant Professor at TU.)