My Speech about National Exam (UN)

The Bad Side of Assessing Students’ Learning

by Doing National Examination

            Two years ago, I did national examination as a condition to graduate from senior high school. At that time I was afraid that I could not pass the examination well. Moreover, my anxiety about national examination made me study under pressure and, honestly, that was not good. You felt it too, didn’t you?

            That is a little picture of my speech that I am going to convey in this good occasion, entitled “The Bad Side of Assessing Students’ Learning by Doing National Examination”.

            Ladies and Gentlemen

            National examination is a standardized national test to assess students’ learning in primary school until high school level. Since few years ago, national examination has already become pros and cons in the public. People who support and agree with the national examination execution opine that it has positive values for students. The positive values from national examination, such as national examination will increase students’ human resources quality and it can be an indicator of students’ intelligence development. The government, in this case Ministry of Education and Culture will be able to know what aspect of study materials that need to be improved.

However, national examination is not only about good values because it also has bad side. Charging students with national examination as a graduation stipulation is not a best way to improve students’ intelligence. It is not fair that we can graduate from school or not just by passing an exam, which is held in few days and with a standard score from the ministry. How about learning process for three years that have been done by the students? Does it mean nothing?

Ladies and Gentlemen

Let’s we compare the education in border and underprivileged areas with big cities in Indonesia. In border and underprivileged areas, education facilities and learning resources are limited while big cities have very complete education facilities and broad access to get learning resources. By doing national examination, students from border and underprivileged areas are forced to get score and have educational quality that same with big cities’ students. Furthermore, the standard score of national examination becomes higher and higher over the years. Without equality in education, it is hard for the students in border and underprivileged areas to reach that standard.

Another bad side that caused by national examination is the students who do not pass the exam will feel very hysterical. Moreover, there is stigma that the students who failed in national examination are stupid or unintelligent. It will cause social and psychological burden to them. It is not surprising that every year, when the exam result is announced, the failed students become depressed or the worst is there is suicide case among the failed students.

Ladies and Gentlemen

Do you know how much government budget for executing national examination? It is 580 billion rupiah that is prepared by the government to held national examination. That is not a little money for a program that does not have direct effect in improving education quality. On the other hand, the government can use the money for extending education facilities and rebuilding schools that are broken in Indonesia or offering scholarship to the students who have financial difficulty.

Ladies and Gentlemen

To sum up, the execution of national examination need to be evaluated for there are bad effects that is caused by it. It will feel fair for the students if their graduation is decided by assessing their learning in every meeting and seeing their study report in school.

That’s all of my speech. Hopefully it will be meaningful and I am sorry if I made mistakes.

Thank you for your kind attention!