Private lessons,tests,and the educational reform .

The Characteristics of the latest educational reform in Tunisia

 There have been numerous educational reforms in the history of the Tunisian republic.All of them were taken by the president of the republic if not by one of the newly nominated ministers of education.Seldom was there any research or survey on which those reforms were based.Teachers,students and parents kept criticising those reforms claiming that each new minister of education had to make a reform just to show that he passed by the ministry .

For the first time in the history of the Tunisian republic teachers, parents and students take part in the educational reform together with experts in education, and civil society associations. Therefore,whatever the results of this reform would be, every one of the participants would feel responsible for it.They would either be proud of what they did or try to improve it.

Revising testing in the new educational reform

As  a Tunisian teacher who took part in one of Louis Braille Prep School committees that worked on the educational reform day, I found that the  current way of testing and especially correcting tests  is one of the biggest problems that affected the present-day educational system in Tunisia and created the dilemna of private lessons. In fact when the teachers themselves assign, design, and correct the tests of their own students without any collaboration, interference or supervision,they will find an open way to pump up marks and qualify or disqualify students depending on whether they are having private lessons or not rather than depending on their school performance.
Private lessons that are plaguing our educational system are not the default in themselves.Most parents and students insist on taking private lessons if the students need them and keep embarrassing teachers who refuse to give them.It goes without saying that in heterogenous classes as the Tunisian ones ,students do not have the same potential and ability to understand lessons which makes the differences between the brilliant students and the underachievers appear clearly and makes the latters and their parents feel the need for private lessons.
That need could be satisfied without affecting the educational system if the teachers who design the tests or correct them are not themselves the same teachers who teach the students and give them marks.
In brief. the tests given in the classroom have to be formative tests and not certification ones.