This year’s college entrance exams once again saw a so-called “Arabic Lottery Effect”, which describes test takers of “Arabic I” obtaining higher relative scores than those of other foreign language subjects despite having unimpressive proficiency. (Image: Yonhap)
SEOUL, Dec. 13 (Korea Bizwire) – This year’s college entrance exams once again saw a so-called “Arabic Lottery Effect”, which describes test takers of “Arabic I” obtaining higher relative scores than those of other foreign language subjects despite having unimpressive proficiency.
According to findings by Haneul Education Corp, which runs educational academies nationwide, if students had simply colored in the “3” balloon on their answer sheets to every question on the Arabic I test, they would have gained a raw score of 13, placing them in the fourth tier (tiers range from 1-9).
If every answer chosen was “5”, that would guarantee a raw score of 11, placing the student in the fifth tier with a standard score of 46 and a percentile rank of 39.
If every answer chosen was “5”, that would guarantee a raw score of 11, placing the student in the fifth tier with a standard score of 46 and a percentile rank of 39. (Image: Yonhap)
For foreign language subject tests of German, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese and traditional Chinese characters, a raw score of 11 would have in comparison landed the test taker in the seventh tier.
The highest standard score in Arabic I was 90, considerably higher than the equivalent of other foreign language tests, though it was a drop from the 100 recorded last year.
Standard scores are used to compare a student’s performance to the rest of his or her peers. If average scores on the test are lower, standard scores go up and vice versa.
An administrator at Haneul Education Corp predicted that Arabic I would continue to increase in popularity as a foreign language test subject up until 2021, and also stated that foreign language testing should incorporate absolute evaluation like the English portion of the CSAT test (English is not included as one of the foreign language subject tests).
Lina Jang (linajang@koreabizwire.com)
