The Advantages And Disadvantages Of University Entrance Exams

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THE ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES

OF UNIVERSITY ENTRANCE EXAMS

Admission procedures and entrance tests vary widely across countries and across universities. Usually, admission to a university is based upon the performance of the candidates in some written examinations. In some countries, students can apply for admission to a university during their last year of high school or during their last year of community college. In other countries there are standardized admission exams taken only after completing high school or community college.

Today, universities are in competition in setting excellent educational standards aimed at admitting only the best students and producing graduates of quality. To be able to achieve such objectives, universities have implemented exams based admission procedures, in order to ensure that only students who qualify or pass certain categories are admitted.

As we all know the entrance to a university and the admission exam is very important to every student. University entrance exams are considered to be a proper approach in admitting the students into the universities and a significant factor determining the student’s future development. The entrance examination system has its advantages and disadvantages, but evens so it is still one of the most important and core issues in all education systems.

I think that the main advantage of university entrance exams is that the admission exams can make the most use of a student`s talent an important aspiration to all countries. First of all, examination before entering a certain university can determine a student`s real abilities, as many students choose the wrong universities thus being unhappy with their choice and later abandoning school.

Entrance based on exams improves the selection of qualified students for universities, in order to ensure the quality of freshmen. Tests provide an opportunity for candidates to fully depend on themselves. Studying for the university entrance exams motivates millions of young people around world to study hard, increasing the general level of intellectual ability of the whole nation. The fact that many students cheat at the university entrance exams in order to reach their aim is very unfair, destroying the chance of entrance to the honest students.

First, university entrance exams act as an effective evaluation measure to classify the levels of students. According to the exam results, students with high scores will enter their major which generates huge demand for academic knowledge in certain professions. Meanwhile, examinees with low scores on the entrance exams will have to pick vocational schools to get the training necessary to secure a job quickly.

Secondly, this exam is regarded as the first challenge for students who wish to attend top universities. Passing a university entrance exam with high results serves as a target which the students must pull themselves together in order to achieve. To some of them, this is the warm-up in preparation for an independent life.

The second major benefit on using an exam for admitting students into a university is thought to be that all of the students are being treated equally. In order to get good results, students must be hard working, considerable, insistent and knowledgeable, and these attributes, are just what the society needs right now.

This aspect can also be seen as a disadvantage, since measuring students` abilities with a unified examination system that has the same requirements for all is a bit improper. Because of their limited time and academic pressure, students are dedicated only to the fields tested in the entrance exams, while completely ignoring others interesting field.

Another big advantage is that university entrance exams promote competition among students. In order to achieve their goal, they work harder therefore improving their knowledge and skills. Any type of exam helps the students a lot, because it brings an improvement in their individual knowledge, providing feedback and making the students to acknowledge their weaknesses and work on them.

University entrance exams are also an excellent tool used by teachers in order to determine the efficacy of their teaching methods, because through exams, the high school teachers get an opportunity to monitor and evaluate their teaching strategies according to their student`s progress.

Entrance exams are beneficial not just to the school itself but also to the students. Admission exams are established by the school administration in order to filter students as there are some universities that aim towards excellence and where the actual intellectual capacity of a student is more important than his financial capability. By producing graduates of quality gives the university prestige and honor maintaining highest standards.

On the one hand, university admission exams prove to be beneficial to some of the students and to the educational system as a whole. On the other hand, university entrance exam has shown a lot of disadvantages which sometimes obstruct the studying path of the students. From my standpoint, despite their advantages, university entrance exams as they are design now, are not supposed to be a requirement for students who desire to pursue higher education.

Due to exams important role in evaluating students` levels, they carry a heavy burden to have a satisfactory performance in the exams. They concentrate so much on mastering any subjects that it nearly wears them out. It has been shown that heavy pressure when studying has resulted in a number of suicide cases and mental illnesses such as autism.

There are certain some disadvantages of university entrance exams. First, the exams have a poor predictive quality because they judge a student`s ability under a set of predetermined conditions and during a limited time. Many times students who are otherwise good students may get very anxious or confused with the subjects under the strict exam conditions, making them to fail. No matter the exam, it should not define the ability of a certain person. Exams are really important for some, but they pressure others so much.

Secondly, many universities entrance exams encourage memorizing instead of thinking and rationalizing. Having a fixed curriculum, students focus only on passing the entrance exam. Universities should shift their focus on score achievements, rather than on knowledge enhancement. Students are hardly interested in gaining any knowledge as a way of discovering the world, but with these entrance exams they are just very concerned about their grades. This attitude from the students gradually changes the true meaning of university education.

In conclusion, while universities require for the students to pass an entrance exam as an effective tool for them in order to attend higher education, it is not an optimum selection method and I think it should be replaced with some alternative admission methods for the sake of the young generation. However, if some improvements are made to remove the disadvantages mentioned before, university entrance exams certainly provide many more educational advantages. Therefore, I believe that if the entire admission system will reform, the benefits of the university entrance exams will outweigh their disadvantages.