When teachers cheat
Students can be disqualified if they cheat in examinations. But what if the cheating was organised by teachers in order to make the school look good?
The South China Morning Post reported last week that a school in the New Territories apparently did just that. In order to shore up the average scores of its students in the Territory System Assessment (TSA) tests, teachers reportedly used various tricks to bar their low-achieving students from taking them.
They allegedly persuaded the parents of these students to keep them at home on the two days the tests were held in early July. More than 20 such students who defied the advice and turned up at school were rounded up and hidden from external invigilators.
All school systems need diagnostic tools to monitor standards, and identify schools and students that need assistance. The TSA tests - in Chinese, English and mathematics - are administered to all Primary Three and Six students as a means of tracking their performance against established standards. Naturally, schools should take these tests seriously as a measure of how well they are doing compared with their counterparts. But some schools are serious to a fault, because of Hong Kong's peculiar conditions.
Although a school's TSA scores are not supposed to directly affect its fate, schools are taking no chances, because those with falling enrolment may be told to close as the school-age population shrinks. Officials have reported a high correlation between a school's popularity, as measured by enrolment, and its students' academic performance. So schools are worried that their TSA scores might be used against them should they need to appeal against a closure order.
At present, the TSA test scores are not published. But schools are concerned that their reputation would be ruined if the scores were leaked. Moreover, public pressure for more transparency might lead to their eventual publication in future.
Perhaps the schools' greatest fear is that the scores might be used as a statistical tool to scale their students' scores, to determine their order of allocation to secondary schools. They may not be used for this purpose in the foreseeable future, because a working group has already proposed using Pre-Secondary One scores from the Hong Kong Attainment Test as the scaling tool. Still, for as long as the Hong Kong school system continues to sift and sort students at various stages, schools will do all they can to ensure their pupils score well in all public assessments.
For some, that involves familiarising their students with the tests' formats. Indeed, no sooner had the first TSA tests been conducted, last year, than publishers began producing sample test papers to help schools drill their students. For others, particularly those with falling enrolments, the temptation to use wayward means of achieving that aim would be high.
Education officials are investigating whether the school named in last week's press report had really cheated. Although such perpetrators do not derive any direct material benefits from the exercise, their students are the victims. Had the low-achieving students been allowed to take the tests, the scores would have given a more accurate picture of the school's overall performance, so that appropriate remedial action could be taken to help the students.
It is not clear what kind of penalties can be meted out to the school managers, principal and teachers who may be responsible. But they should be hauled before the teaching profession's ruling body and be subjected to the most severe disciplinary action.
C.K. Lau is the Post's executive editor, policy
