GRADING IN UPPER SECONDARY SCHOOLS
AND THE MATRICULATION EXAMINATION
Faculty of Behavioural Sciences/ Centre for Educational Assessment / http://www.helsinki.fi/cea/ Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
John Bishop (1998) has singled out CBEEES as the form of examination
most germane for advancing student achievement.
He defines CBEEES through five characteristics:
• student’s accomplishment in the exam has real consequences
• the exam defines achievement relative to an external standard
• the exams are organized by discipline and keyed to the content of
specific course sequences
• the exams signal multiple levels of achievement in the subject, and
• the exams cover almost all secondary school students
The Finnish matriculation examination has traditionally aligned well with
the model, reflected in status as qualification for tertiary education and as
feedback to schools regarding their implementation of the curriculum and,
hence, working as a guideline for assessment in the different subjects.
CBEEES CURRICULUM BASED EXTERNAL EXIT EXAM SYSTEMS
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
Yet, major reforms regarding both the upper secondary syllabus
and the matriculation examination have endangered the role of the
matriculation examination as providing this feedback due to
fracturing the student body into different subgroups sitting for the
different exams comprising the matriculation examination.
• Reform of the structure of general upper secondary studies.
• The abolition of the mandatory status of the exam in the other
national language (Swedish / Finnish).
• The dividing of the earlier one exam for all the natural science /
socio-humanistic subjects to ten different subject-specific exams.
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
During the 1990s and early 2000, the traditional three-year structure of
the general upper secondary curriculum was abandoned and the syllabus
of each subject was divided into independent six-week-long courses,
offered successively within five periods during the school year and ending
each with a course-specific exam at the end of the period.
The mean of these forms the ‘grade point average’ (GPA) used when
applying into the universities of applied sciences.
Students are to build their own syllabi from these courses, most often
including to their programme five or six courses per period.
THE UPPER SECONDARY SYLLABUS
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
Students’ choice of courses is governed by the distribution of lesson
hours stated in a Government decree (FNBE, 2003, pp. 252–258) with
the compulsory syllabus comprising eighteen subjects.
On side of these, many students study additional foreign languages at
either the advanced (continuing from the comprehensive school) or at the
basic level and many schools offer a variety of additional courses.
The requirement for graduation is 75 courses of which 47 are mandatory
(51 for students of A-level mathematics).
In addition to these, the matriculation exam in each subject is based on
‘national specialisation courses’ which all schools have to offer regularly
not to impede students’ examination plans (FNBE, 2003, p. 255)
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
The number of both the mandatory and the specialisation courses per
subject varies considerably, leading to widely varying personal syllabi
and, reflecting this, to exam choices in the matriculation examination.
The matriculation examination comprises 39 different exams in 24
subjects (some at different levels).
Each student has to sit for at least 4 exams (mean 5.5) of which Finnish /
Swedish (mother tongue or as ‘second language) is mandatory.
The other three exams have to be chosen from among: mathematics (A-
or B-level), A-level foreign languages (E, G, F, R, S), the other domestic
language (A- or B-level Swedish or Finnish), and any of the ten exams in
the natural and socio-humanistic subjects.
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
Mandatory Specialisation Total
Finnish/Swedish 6 3 9
A-level language 6 2 8
B-level language (S/F) 5 2 7
C-level language 8 8
A-level mathematics 10 3 13
B-level mathematics 6 2 8
Physics 1 7 8
History 4 2 6
Biology 2 3 5
Chemistry 1 4 5
Psychology 1 4 5
Religion / Ethics 3 2 5
Philosophy 1 3 4
Geography 2 2 4
Social studies 2 2 4
Health education 1 2 3
The Finnish school grades run from 4 (failed) to 10 (excellent)
SUBJECTS & COURSES IN THE SYLLABUSFINNISH/SWEDISH/SAMI AS MOTHER TONGUE AND/OR LANGUAGE OF INSTRUCTION, SWEDISH/FINNISH AS THE SECOND NATIONAL LANGUAGE, ENGLISH AS THE OBLIGATORY ADVANCED-LEVEL FOREIGN LANGUAGE, MATHEMATICS, BIOLOGY, GEOGRAPHY, PHYSICS, CHEMISTRY, HISTORY, SOCIAL STUDIES,PHILOSOPHY, PSYCHOLOGY, RELIGION OR ETHICS, HEALTH EDUCATION, PHYSICAL EDUCATION, MUSIC, ARTS, AND EDUCATIONAL AND VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE.
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
Mandatory Mandatory & SpecialisationB-level mathematics 7,05 6,98
B-level Swedish 7,06 7,00
A-level mathematics 7,39 7,31
A-level English 7,54 7,49
Biology 7,59 7,57
Chemistry 7,66 7,45
History 7,67 7,68
Philosophy 7,73 7,71
Finnish/Swedish 7,74 7,69
Social studies 7,78 7,77
Religion 7,79 7,78
Geography 7,81 7,83
Physics 7,86 7,48
Health education 7,92 7,94
Psychology 7,97 7,86
COURSE GRADES (SAMPLE OF 2000 STUDENTS IN 37 SCHOOLS)
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
Female MaleB-level mathematics 7,04 6,85
B-level Swedish 7,33 6,57
A-level mathematics 7,39 7,25
Chemistry 7,45 7,43
A-level English 7,47 7,52
Physics 7,51 7,41
Biology 7,64 7,48
History 7,66 7,70
Social studies 7,82 7,70
Geography 7,85 7,80
Philosophy 7,88 7,47
Finnish 7,96 7,32
Religion 7,98 7,49
Psychology 8,10 7,54
Health education 8,23 7,54
GENDER DIFFERENCES
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
It is apparent that the number of courses and the grades awarded in
them guide students’ choices regarding both the subjects studied at
school and the exams included in the matriculation examination.
This is especially the case for weaker students – and girls – who do
no aim into the STEM fields.
This can be seen especially in the sky-rocketing rise in popularity of
Health education once it was introduced into the examination in 2007.
COURSELOAD, GRADES, AND EXAM CHOICES
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
• The correlation between students’ school grade in a subject (mean for all
courses) and their grade in the respective exam in the matriculation
examination varied between r = .49 and r = .80 (Religion/Ethics and A-
level English, respectively) with a mean of r = .69.
• The relations are relatively low with students’ school grade explaining on
average only 48 % (24 % – 64 %) of the variance in their exam success.
• Among the natural science / socio-humanistic subjects, only the grades
in Physics, Chemistry, and Psychology explained (or predicted) more
than 50 % of the variance in the matriculation exam.
• This might provide too little information to the student but offers even
less to the schools regarding the students who study the subjects at
least to some length but do not partake in the exam.
• Yet, the correlation between students’ overall matriculation examination
attainment (mean of all exam grades) and their GPA was relatively high
at r = .79, with no gender difference, implying the force of both as a
general indicator for academic achievement.
RELATION OF SCHOOL AND EXAM GRADES
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
The unfairness caused by the Gaussian grade distribution in the
matriculation examination is most apparent in the relative success of
students – especially girls – sitting for the A-level math exam.
Their grade in Mathematics, Physics, and Chemistry can hardly represent
correctly their relative aptitude in them!
And the students of B-level math should not even bother to try them...
ATTAINMENT BY MATH AND GENDER
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
2,5
3,0
3,5
4,0
4,5
5,0
5,5
Fin
nis
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Mat
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A-E
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B-S
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A-L
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C-L
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Bio
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Geo
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Ph
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Ch
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y
His
tory
Soci
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tud
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Ph
iloso
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Re
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Hea
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No Math Female
No Math Male
B-Level Female
B-Level Male
A-Level Female
A-Level Male
Differences between schools are statistically significant for most subjects
both for the matriculation examination and for school marks (p ≤ .001,
effect sizes between eta2 = .073 and eta2 = .215).
In most subjects, school and exams grades are relatively highly correlated
but there are clear differences between schools in this.
Somewhat surprisingly, the difference is bigger in subjects that most
students include in their examination: Finnish, A-level English, and A-level
mathematics, taken by nearly all students who study the advanced
syllabus – so all differences are not due to exam selection.
For example, the school grade in A-level math of students receiving a ‘cum
laude approbatur’ – the middle grade awarded to 24 % of examinees – in
the matriculation exam varied between 5.1 and 7.3 on the scale from 4
(failed) to 10 /(excellent).
BETWEEN-SCHOOL DIFFERENCES
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
The differences in B-level math might indicate real differences in grading
or just that there are between-school differences in the share of students
who do or don’t include math in their matriculation examination – 20 % of
all but closer to 30 % of female examinees.
A-AND B-LEVEL MATHEMATICS
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
-1,50
-1,00
-,50
,00
,50
1,00
1,50
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 4 4 4 4 4
Math Basic
Math Basic in GPA
-1,50
-1,00
-,50
,00
,50
1,00
1,50
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 4 4 4 4 4
Math Advanced
Math Adv in GPA
The discrepancy between students’ school marks and their attainment in
the matriculation exam is especially harsh (for the student) in subjects
read to the full and included in the examination only by the best.
Hence, also the feedback for schools is not of much value as even if they
would know the exam results of other schools (reported yearly by one of
the TV channels) they do not know the share and kind of students sitting
for the exam, i.e., the level of pre-selection which most probably varies by
school.
STUDENT / EXAM SELF-SELECTION
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
-2,50
-2,00
-1,50
-1,00
-,50
,00
,50
1,00
1,50
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 4 4 4 4 4
Biology
Biology in GPA
The finding that the mean for school marks varies considerably between
subjects from the 6.98 for B-level (basic) mathematics to the 7.94 of
Health education is disconcerting.
The average grades in most of the more ‘demanding’ subjects (course
load during the studies and hence to be revised for the exam) fall below
the mean of all subjects (7.65) while the grades for all the ‘easier’ subjects
(fewer courses) fall above it.
This can be expected to have a direct impact on students’ choices at
school, especially for those who enter the general upper secondary school
without a long term plan for their future.
This, in turn, through the choices made, might affect their future chances.
•
DISCUSSION
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
It is easy to see that setting explicit criteria for even all the 205 courses
covered by the matriculation examination is a hard endeavour (including
the three Samí language unities taken only by a small number of students
but leaving out the courses covering contents that are not examined in
the matriculation examination but might be studied by the examinees).
Yet, from the point of view of the role grades undoubtedly play in guiding
students’ motivation and course choices, carrying all the way to their
examination choices and possibly to future careers, it is clear that the
current situation is far from ideal.
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
The first step might be for the respective subject teacher organisations to
prepare guidelines and sample school exams for at least some of the
courses – preferably beginning from the mandatory courses as many
students make their initial decision for or against continuing their studies
in a subject already based on the first graded paper they are handed at
the end of the very first course.
An effect of this has been seen many times in beginning students’
propensity to change from A- to B-level mathematics – a phenomenon
which will hopefully be alleviated by the new curriculum with its first
common-to-all math course (hopefully with clear criterion-based guide-
lines for grading).
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015
Yet, already before that, discussions should be opened up in each
school among all the teachers regarding the discrepancy between the
grade means in the different subjects.
Do they reflect differences in the (lack of) clear criteria, in the relative
difficulty to derive explicit criteria from the descriptive course-specific
goals set in the curriculum, or do they imply that the criteria for some
subjects simply just are harder to meet than those in some other
subjects?
If the latter, is it fair to make the students pay for it with their grades and
maybe future choices?
Sirkku Kupiainen / Forum Criteriorum 2015