NCEA Internal Figures Were Inflated

act-new-zealand

Thu Feb 13 2003 13:00:00 GMT+1300 (New Zealand Daylight Time)

NCEA Internal Figures Were Inflated

Thursday, 13 February 2003, 3:21 pm
Press Release: ACT New Zealand

Trevor Mallard calls the NCEA a "triumph" but ACT New Zealand Education Spokesman Deborah Coddington says it is a fraud.

"According to the New Zealand Qualifications Authority website, this national assessment is designed to be `valid, consistent, accurate and fair' but the interim results show it is anything but," Miss Coddington said.

"Take maths, for example. Is it consistent or fair that there were twice as many `excellences' given for internal assessment compared with external exams, and half as many failures?

"This raises serious questions about schools giving out inflated grades, and is grossly unfair to students. This is exactly what ACT predicted would happen.

"Where's the fairness and consistency between subjects when only 0.3 per cent of the 8561 students who sat Biology achievement standard 1.8 achieved an excellence, whereas in Information Management standard 1.2, 35.2 per cent of the 10,934 students achieved an excellence?

"Scaling has become a dirty word among the PC brigade in the NZQA and the Ministry of Education but School Certificate scaling between years, subjects and marks ensured a high degree of fairness and accuracy.

"If this government is committed to a knowledge economy it will support a moratorium on the introduction of NCEA Levels 2 and 3 and stop using this year's Year 12 students as guinea pigs in one of the most dangerous experiments foisted on New Zealand children," Miss Coddington said.

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