POLICY EVALUATION OF ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT AND ITS IMPACT ON STUDENTS’ LEARNING PROFICIENCY (Published)
This paper aims to investigate the policy of assessing student achievement used in Saudi Arabia which called “continuous assessment/evaluation”, (i.e. it is the follow-up and testing the proficiency of the student’s skills) as placed by the department of Educational Supervision in Ministry of Education. Moreover, this research paper evaluate the process of students’ assessment and its effectiveness to overcome the obstacles and propose appropriate solutions of assessment methods that suit the Saudi students’ nature and environment. One main question arises here. It is “Is this programme commensurate with Saudi social and cultural society?” this question is divided into two sub-questions. They are “Does it fulfill the desired standard goals?” Then, “What are the advantages and disadvantages of the assessment used?” Therefore, it is necessary to assume and find answers to these questions. The method used is the historical and descriptive analytical method. The samples participated in this study include 40 teachers and supervisors work in the Dawadmi General Directorate of Education in Saudi Arabia. A 25-item questionnaire is distributed to the sample to sum out the participants’ point of views about the goals, advantages, and disadvantages of the assessment method used in Saudi Arabia. The most important result is that this programme needs modifications to suit the Saudi nature and environment. Moreover, finds out that this programme makes students dependent learners. Therefore, the study, mostly, recommends that it needs intensive efforts and experiments to study the Saudi situation in order to find suitable pedagogical methods of assessment that suit Saudi students’ nature; and administering intensive training programmes for both teachers and supervisors.
Keywords: Applied Linguistics, Evaluation Policy