Do High-Stakes Exams Promote Consistent Educational Standards?

Resource type
Report
Authors/contributors
Title
Do High-Stakes Exams Promote Consistent Educational Standards?
Abstract
Each year over two million secondary-school students across English-speaking West Africa sit coordinated exams, with the explicit goal of maintaining consistent educational standards across schools and over time. We find that scores across math items drawn from different exam years—when taken by an identical group of students on the same day—closely track fluctuations in Ghana’s national pass rates over time, absent any role for cheating or changes in real performance.
Report Number
581
Report Type
Working Paper
Series Title
Working Papers
Institution
Center for Global Development
Date
2021
Language
en
Accessed
07/04/2022, 19:42
Citation
Rossiter, J., Abreh, M. K., Ali, A., & Sandefur, J. (2021). Do High-Stakes Exams Promote Consistent Educational Standards? (Working Paper No. 581; Working Papers). Center for Global Development. https://www.cgdev.org/publication/do-high-stakes-exams-promote-consistent-educational-standards