TEACH-NOW M6U1A3: High Stakes Assessment Comparison of College Entrance Exams in the United States and Germany

American students taking the SAT

In the United States, students are generally required to take at least one college entrance exam in order to apply to college. 

These include the SAT and ACT, and many colleges also ask to see students' AP test scores and SAT subject test scores as well. The preparation for these tests can be overwhelming, at best, and can drive students in the United States to withdraw socially and hyper-focus on attaining the highest score possible. (CBS Miami, 2013) 

Students in the United States will commonly take special test preparation courses, hire tutors, give up extracurricular activities, and spend all of their spare time drilling information in preparation for these many tests. 

All of this preparation can also be costly, and on top of that expense, there are the test fees themselves: about $60 for the ACT, $60 for the SAT, and $94 for every AP test a student takes.
The high stakes of these college entrance exams aren't just for the students, but teachers, schools, and districts can also be judged by the exam scores and similar state college readiness exams of their students. (Svab, 2013) Therefore, there can be an immense amount of pressure on not only each student, but also their families and schools, for that student to score well.

The German system
In Germany, there is one (free) final exam at the end of a university preparation student's high school career, and that is the Abitur. Although the Abitur is the most "high-stakes" that a high school exam can be, German students seem to experience less stress surrounding this exam, as it is simply the culmination of their years of concentrated study, and a long-term curriculum specifically designed to prepare German students to take this exam. 

As is shown in the below diagram, the Abitur is what all German Gymnasium students work towards in their academic careers: this one test needs to encompass all of their learning from the first through twelfth class. (Gymnasium schools are the university preparation schools in Germany, and German students are separated into Gymnasium schools anywhere from fifth to seventh grade.)

A diagram of Germany's education system

It's also worth noting that not every student in Germany takes the Abitur. Although the number of students taking the Abitur has increased since the 1970's, students who graduate from Realschule or Hauptschule are not expected to take the Abitur, but to attend a professional school or begin an apprenticeship. This means that unlike in the United States, most students in Germany are not spending their high school years preparing for a college entrance exam.

Specifically, as of the year 2000, only 11% of jobholders in the country of Germany had taken the Abitur. By contrast, in October 2016, almost 70% of high school graduates were enrolled in colleges or universities, almost all of whom require some form of college entrance exam. (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2016)

It's therefore possible to speculate that the extreme anxiety that American students (and their parents, as well as their teachers) experience surrounding college entrance exams may in some part be because those students are ill-prepared for the exams, having not been on a college preparatory track since fifth or sixth grade as German Gymnasium students are.

Abitur schools vary from state to state
Some recent studies in Germany have revealed a large gap between the percentage of students scoring very high (1 is the "highest" score) in the different states of Germany. When students score well on the exam, it reflects directly on their teachers, and, in turn, their state schooling system. Therefore, it may benefit some German states to administer a slightly easier Abitur to their students, in order to bolster their image in the view of the country. ("Abitur lottery sparks tougher exam debate" 2015)

German students taking the Abitur

Test taking pressureIn the past, the Abitur was an even more "high stakes exam" for German students -- one that could cause real devastation as a result of not taking or passing the exam at the end of Gymnasium. The most exaggerated case is the young man who shot several people in Erfurt, Germany in 2002 because he was expelled from school before taking his Abitur, thus negating his career possibilities. ("How a school shooting" 2017) Since that time, Germany has changed their laws to allow students to apply for placements at vocational schools without an Abitur. 

How Gymnasium teachers benefit
With such a high-stakes exam looming for German students, it is surprising to see that teachers still enjoy a great deal of freedom as they teach subjects that will be included in the Abitur. German schools generally do not require teachers to adhere to as strict a curriculum as they do in the United States, so teachers who have taught in both countries find that they do far less "teaching to the test" in German than they do in the United States. ("Why you should teach" 2014) You see, for German teachers, their class is just part of the greater picture, equipping students to score well on the Abitur, rather than a "means to an end" in itself, with a district-wide high stakes test at the end of their specific class.

Shortened preparation time not a factor
Another "stressor" that had been cited by German students and their parents has been that in recent years, the time students spend in Gymnasium has recently been shortened by a year. (There used to be a 13th grade in most schools.) Students and their parents were afraid that their Abitur-related stress would be heightened by this change, but recent students have shown this not to be the case. (Minkley, Rest, Terstegen, Kirchner, Wolf, 2013)

The crux of the difference between the two systems These are just some of the differences between the high-stakes tests administered by the United States and German government to their college-bound students. Since fewer German students go to what Americans would consider a "traditional college," fewer of them take their one, large college readiness exam. And since the German Gymnasium students' preparation has taken place since fifth grade, there seems to be considerably less stress associated with taking this test.


References
Abitur lottery sparks tougher exam debate (2015, June 10) Retrieved from https://www.thelocal.de/20150610/abitur-germany-education-standards-quality

Minkley, N., Rest, M., Tergersten, S., Kirchner, W.H., Wolf, O.T. (2013) Mehr Stress durch G8? Akute und chronische Stressbelastung von Abiturienten mit regulärer und verkürzter Gymnasialzeit. Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Nina_Minkley/publication/283638318_Mehr_Stress_durch_G8_Akute_und_chronische_Stressbelastung_von_Abiturienten_mit_regularer_und_verkurzter_Gymnasialzeit/links/575e711408ae9a9c955c2472.pdf

Svab, P. (2013, November 22) State Education Chancellor Defends Teacher and School Evaluations. Retrieved from http://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/367782-state-education-commissioner-defends-teacher-and-school-evaluations/

Students Go To Extreme Measures to Get Higher Test Scores. (2013, November 17) Retrieved from http://miami.cbslocal.com/2013/11/17/students-go-to-extreme-measures-to-get-higher-test-scores/


Trines, S. (2016, November 8) Education in Germany. Retrieved from http://wenr.wes.org/2016/11/education-in-germany

Why you should teach English in Germany (2014, April 14) Retrieved from https://www.thelocal.de/20140414/why-you-should-become-an-english-teacher-in-germany

U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (2016) College Enrollment and Work Activity of 2016 Graduates. Retrieved from https://www.bls.gov/news.release/hsgec.nr0.htm

Diagram of the German education system retrieved from https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2e/German_School_System.png

Photograph of students taking the Abitur retrieved from https://www.thelocal.de/userdata/images/1433933587_abitur%20exam.jpg

Photograph of students taking the SAT retrieved from http://static4.businessinsider.com/image/55706c30eab8eac25fc67cd0-1190-625/the-best-piece-of-advice-for-taking-the-sat-is-shockingly-simple.jpg