Public Observers at USE must have a Wider View

On November 18, 2013, Yaroslav Kuzminov, Head of the Russian Public Chamber Commission for Education Development, took part in the all-Russian forum ‘Public Observations of the Unified State Examination (USE) in 2014’. The forum looked at how procedures for the USE could be improved.

Over the last year the public has come to a consensus in terms of the USE, it’s now widely acknowledged that there has never been a better way of evaluating future university students’ knowledge. However the USE has been accompanied by scandal since it’s inception. Tasks appear on the internet before the exams, organizers turn a blind eye to cheating, they help specific entrants in the examination hall, and so on.

The law allows for public observers when USE is taking place, and there has been a trial of technology for long-distance examining, as well as many examples when observers have stopped violations and defended children’s rights. The question is, how will this institution further develop?

Who will become observers? This is voluntary work, and the only motivation here is concern for the public good (an observer can’t go to any examination centre where a relative is taking the exam). According to Yaroslav Kuzminov, who referred to the Public Opinion Foundation data, the volunteer community in Russia is a narrow group: only about 3% of the population are volunteers, but the base where they are recruited from is substantial – 37% of Russians say that they care about what is going on around them. These people – professionals who have a certain level of income and lifestyle, who trust others more and feel happy more often than the average – are able to observe the USE procedure. Observers should include representatives of universities (including students), non-commercial organizations, regional public chambers, media and other institutions. It’s necessary to give observers more rights and to encourage their interaction with each other, as well as with other public organizations.

According to the HSE Rector, it’s necessary to give public observers the right to be present not during the examination, but also when the task is opened before the exam, and afterwards during the form scanning procedures. Leading analytical centres should get open access to USE databases in order to look at the results. Public observers should also be involved in high school contests, the results of which can provide some leading universities with up to half of their prospective students.

But all this work will only make sense when combined with other measures. They include the necessity of withdrawing a school’s average USE results from the school evaluation criteria, and also by not using the USE results by region as a criterion for evaluating a governor’s effectiveness. These factors, according to Yaroslav Kuzminov, distort the work of regional education administration bodies in terms of USE organization: the model whereby a governor is evaluated by the average USE result in his region is an ‘absurd mistake of government’.

Boris Startsev, specially for the HSE News Service