Students from CMI schools have always been a victim of discrimination, being viewed as second-class students who are 'destined' to use only their native tongue to learn because they are 'incapable' of using another language to do so. And this stereotype was what caused so much discontent and worries among parents when the government started to promote mother-tongue teaching.

But the simple fact we can see is, despite their self-image constantly trashed, CMI students have, over the years, been brave enough to face the inequality and prove their ability and achievements over that of their English medium of instruction (EMI) counterparts.

I doubt how much research has gone into the bloated claim that 'EMI students were more motivated and had higher expectations'. And I question the appropriateness of making such an irresponsible statement at an academic conference.

True researchers are well aware of the fact that while stereotypes abound in our daily conversations, they should be avoided like the plague in serious academic discussions. But the mere fact that the statement was made by a 'novice researcher', being an associate degree student, does not make the mistake excusable.

Yes, we can be tolerant when students make mistakes in their assignments, but such mistakes should not have been allowed to go into the conference in the very first place. If the organiser of the Student Conference, HKU Space Community College, had taken the event more seriously, she would have considered the destructive consequences of such sweeping conclusions made by their students to not only CMI students but also the effort by the government to promote mother-tongue education throughout the years.

CHRISTINE LEE,

North Point

Test ensures students are up to the mark

On the marking method on the Use of English, Section E paper (UEE) of the HKALE, 'Drawing the lines for language success' (Education Post, May 12), the Hong Kong Examinations and Assessment Authority released a press statement on April 27 to address this issue with the following message: One of the aims of the UEE paper, Practical Skills for Work and Study, is to determine whether candidates can apply their language skills by writing precisely in situations related to work and study.

For task one in the 2007 paper, candidates were asked to write a persuasive letter to a company within a specified limit of 500 words. The task is designed to assess the ability of candidates to process information, to compare and contrast information and to use this information in dealing with a variety of communication tasks and problems. To present ideas effectively within the word limit is an integral part of the assessment design of the task.

The panel of examiners found that a minority of candidates wrote well beyond the 500-word limit for this task, although the instructions clearly state that the candidate should '...write a letter of no more than 500 words'.

There are two components in the marking scheme for this task, content and presentation. In this year's marking scheme, content marks will not be awarded for that part of a candidate's response that exceeds the 500-word limit. This means that candidates who have not followed the instructions and have exceeded the set word limit will not gain an advantage in terms of scoring content points.

By enforcing the word limit, markers are able to discriminate more accurately between more and less able candidates.

However, the presentation marks will be awarded for overall performance on the task. Even where candidates have exceeded the word limit for task one, they will still be able to score presentation marks as markers have been instructed to read to the end of the letter.

Some have enquired why the marking scheme for 2007 differs from the scheme for 2006. It should be understood that different questions are set every year and the marking schemes for the HKCE and HKAL examinations are finalised only after a series of professional discussions by the chief examiner and the assistant examiners.

They study the questions set and analyse the performance of candidates, then decide on a final marking scheme. The issue of candidates significantly exceeding the word limit was identified as a problem in the responses of 2007 candidates, and thus the marking scheme was developed to address this.

PUBLIC AFFAIRS UNIT,

the Hong Kong Examinations and Assessment Authority