University test reducing 3 years to 1 day

[funxus]

Yesterday, there was a national test in Sweden called the university test. It's a way to jack up your grade if you weren't satisfied with your highschool/gymnasium grades and think you can do better than that, or if you want a reason to be able to stress down in school, if you have the brains. The test takes almost a whole day and it concists of 5 different tests, understanding written English and Swedish, understanding Swedish words, using maps, diagrams and tables and testing logical thinking concerning mathematical problems. When you're done, they compare your result with the rest of the people who did the test and give you an index number (from 0.0 to 2.0 with 1.0 as a base I think),and it can be used to apply for college and university in Sweden.

It's a second chance to if you lack the grades to be admitted to a certain course, and it can give you a greater chance of being admitted to a program many want to study. But, do you think it's fair to practically equate 3 years of hard work in highschool/gymnasium, to get a good grade, with a 1 day test, not testing more than 3 subjects? Do you have something similar in your country, or are you "doomed" if your highschool grades sucked? Did any Swedes here do it?

I did the test because most people do it, and it can increase the chance of getting in somewhere, but for me, my highschool grades are probably better than the test-grade, because I work for it. Which is why I feel it's a bit unfair...

 

[cgannon64]

Reminds me of the SAT. You can get a 100 average all through high school, but if you bomb the SAT, you're not going to college.

Luckily you can take it a few times though, so chances are you'll end up getting a grade that reflects, more or less, your high school grades.

 

[S.P.Q.R.]

If it's only an opportunity to improve your chances, I don't really think it's unfair.
If you HAD to be good in this test in order to be accepted to the program you like, that would be something different...

 

[carlosMM]

I guess that's not bad, here, if you have a middle school equivalent work for ten years in a field and aquire enough knowledge to go to university - you still need to get a high school diploma to be allowed in. Shortcut routes for people who do not fit the system - why not? If the test is tough enough?

 

[Richard III]

The unfair part is that you thought it made sense in life to work hard in high school.

 

[Ultraworld]

In the netherlands we do have things like that. However they want to get rid of it because the people who have passed the "tests" (several kinds, some are a day, some a year) still got the wrong primary training OR are not smart enough after all.

 

[EdwardTking]

The way it is going in the UK is that it the test will reduce to about 5 minutes or however long for the university to check that your parent's cheque won't bounce.

 

[TrailblazingScot]

Originally posted by Richard III
The unfair part is that you thought it made sense in life to work hard in high school.

Sucker!

 

[funxus]

Originally posted by Richard III
The unfair part is that you thought it made sense in life to work hard in high school.

Well, people think I'm working hard because I do well, but I actually just think it's a lot easier than the average person. Not picking time consuming subjects I'm not very interested in, and probably won't need, helps a lot too.

The test is an option-test (pick your answer from 4-5 options), but is quite hard. It's easy if you have a good sense for logic and read a lot of books. My downfall (I actually didn't do too bad for being the first time) is the reading Swedish and words...

Reminds me of the SAT.

I think 30% of the people being admitted to a program get in because of their test-result, and the other 70% were admitted because of their grade. So, unlike SAT, you're not required to do well on it to go to college.

 

[newfangle]

The idea of a single test affecting pretty much the rest of my life sickens me.

We go to high school for half a decade for a specific reason. Having it trivialized with one test is just silly.

 

[The Yankee]

Sounds like the GED test in high school...if you just drop out of HS, but come back and take the test later and do well enough, there's your diploma. It isn't held as high as going through high school, but it counts a lot in your favor if you do very well on it. I should have done it....just left my lousy high school at 16, then take the test.

As for the SAT....well, they also factor in if you took the ACT or SAT II tests....I took the ACT and three SAT II's, which helped out my crappy grade and remarks from my school.

 

[Ultraworld]

Originally posted by newfangle
The idea of a single test affecting pretty much the rest of my life sickens me.

We go to high school for half a decade for a specific reason. Having it trivialized with one test is just silly.

but that is not what they are doing.
that single test is an extra service.

 

[The Yankee]

So, the test can be a huge help.....but it isn't the be-all, end-all. Much like a lot of colleges stateside are doing with the SAT...even that is being marginalized more by the other tests and multiple attempts to the SAT.

 

[Mariusz]

I'll tell you how it works in Poland.
After high school there's an exam for secondary school certifiacte. If you don't pass it you can't go to any university or polytechnic (university of technology). Practically you have to wait until next year. In the meantime you can go to work or join the army. Thankfully most people pass it.
After that there's a second exam. Every university and polytechnic makes it's own test. If you pass then it's OK - you're gonna study there, but if not then you have to try somewhere else or wait until next year.

The conclusion: It doesn't matter how hard you work in high school, everything depends on these two tests. Of course if you work harder then it's easier to prepare to these tests, but it doesn't affect your chances to get to university directly.

I don't know what does SAT mean. Is it something similar to the first test I mentioned?

 

[The Yankee]

Originally posted by newfangle
The idea of a single test affecting pretty much the rest of my life sickens me.

We go to high school for half a decade for a specific reason. Having it trivialized with one test is just silly.

Have a decade? You've been left back?

Took me four years!

 

[The Yankee]

The SAT is a standardized test that most students take in their last year of high school (before college/university). The colleges take these scores into great consideration once a student applies for a particular college. The military may also take this into account for recruiting and training purposes. For instance, the Marines has a certain score which a person must get in order to be considered for certain jobs.

You can take the test every month as long as you can pay for it every month. I took mine in the last term of my junior year...and when I was in 7th grade since I was a part of some special program....but the 7th grade one didn't count.

There are also a few other standardized tests that students may take, the ACT and the SAT IIs. Colleges are starting to like the ACT more since it goes beyond math and reading...it also includes writing/reading comprehension and a scientific reasoning part. It's also supposed to be harder. I actually did better on this than the SAT. The SAT IIs are short, one-hour tests on a specific subject. You can take up to three of them on a particular test date. There are different subjects like Biology, US History, certain levels of math....so on. Colleges will also take these into account, but not as many people take these kinds of tests.

A perfect score is 1600 on the SAT I, or just the SAT...but not even a handful in the nation manage to get that. I believe you get 200 points just for spelling your name correctly, then there are the other scoring rules. It's not as simple as a percentage of what you got right and wrong.

 

[The Yankee]

I should add that the SAT is still a big part of the college admissions. A good score but average grades will strengthen your standing with the college admission workers. The same can be said about good grades with a lousy SAT score...and it happens....but a lot of the time, a bad SAT score with great grades doesn't bring you down as much as a good score with average grades can bring you up. It's all up to whoever's looking at your college application and the college's standards.

 

[JollyRoger]

I only wish a standardized test could have replaced grades in the U.S. Would have helped me get into a better law school since I had a top 2% Law School Admissions Test score and bad college grades. To get into a very selective school, you genrerally need both good grades and a good SAT score. There is a bigger chance that a bad SAT will be your downfall than a good SAT will bail out your bad grades. AT least in your country, you can slide by on either one or the other - you get two optional chances to succeed instead of two compulsary ways to fail.

Since you admit you have "gamed" the grades system by picking easier classes ("not picking time consuming classes. . ."), why do you propose it is unfair for a natural test taker to "game" the system by putting it all on the line in one test?

 

[The Yankee]

Well....what good would it do if you kept bombing in class? I mean...there has to be some balance. I don't know if the current system is right, but it worked for me. My average was around a 77, or just above a C average. Then again, I worked in a "competitive" high school where almost everyone that didn't suck up all day and all night got a C average. My grades and application essays and all that stuff helped. I was only rejected from one of the 13 colleges I applied to....and even then, their football coach was still trying to convince admissions to change the ruling.

 

[funxus]

Originally posted by JollyRoger
Since you admit you have "gamed" the grades system by picking easier classes ("not picking time consuming classes. . ."), why do you propose it is unfair for a natural test taker to "game" the system by putting it all on the line in one test?

To get a good grade in a class usually takes a lot of time and a lot of effort, and even averaging the second best grade (which is considered a very good grade too) usually isn't enough to get into all programs on university. Passing a subject isn't very hard though, and can be done with not very much effort, which means that if you "chill" through highschool and just passing the subjects you need (maybe putting some effort into English, Swedish and Math), while others are working very hard, you can, by only testing 3 subjects, get a grade that is enough to get in to the same educations.

By saying all this I make it sound more unfair than it is, because most people getting a good grade in school get it on the test too, and you still need to pass highschool. Also, most people get in on grades and not on the test. I just think testing 3 subjects is not enough to show how well you'd perform on university, and I'm sure there have been plenty of hard working people who didn't get in because someone had a better sense for these 3 subjects than them.