We are working with the State Testing Centre (STC) under the Cabinet of Ministers to improve the University Entrance Test (UET), which will help to bring it in line with international standards.
The UET is a high-stakes exam which affects thousands of students across the country. It is clearly important both for the students and the universities to which they apply that the UET is both a valid and reliable test.
Since 2004 we have trained a small team of experienced English teachers in the principles and practice of test design. Working together with colleagues from the STC and under the guidance of Dr Rita Green, one of the UK's leading experts on language testing, this team is responsible for the design of a new UET English component.
From June 2006 we have extended the project to 5 other subjects of the UET – maths, history, chemistry, Russian and Uzbek languages. Currently a team comprising school and university teachers as well as colleagues from STC is undergoing a training in test design. From November 2008 we are hoping to include the remaining subjects of the UET – physics, biology, geography, Karakalpak, French and German languages.
After extensive consultation and piloting first changes in English component were introduced in August 2006. These included
- reduction of the number of distracters in the test (ABCD instead of ABCDE)
- introduction of text-based test items (existing tests are based on 1-3 sentences)
Over 80,000 test takers had taken the test and here is the feedback from some of them:
“It was very interesting and exciting to answer the questions”
“These tests are well designed and assess well English language knowledge. I wish to have more tests of this kind"
“Splendid! You’re doing really well, so just go ahead in the same way”
Please contact us if you need to know more about this project.
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