Ebau pilot test that puts students in front of "real life"

Several groups of 1st year Baccalaureate students from 50 educational centers in the country participated yesterday morning in the pilot test of the new university entrance exam, organized by the Ministry of Education in 12 autonomous communities and cities.

This test will serve to adjust and harmonize the exams that will begin to be implemented in June 2024, adapting to the new curricula.

In each of the centers, the students have carried out two exercises: one of a common subject (Spanish Language and Literature, Foreign Language or Philosophy) and another of the compulsory subject of the modality that the student is studying (Artistic Drawing, Latin , Humanities and Social Sciences, Mathematics). In addition, they have completed some cognitive questionnaires and interviews have been carried out with technicians from the Ministry and the autonomous communities, which will make it possible to analyze the impact of the test based on the participating students.

The correction will be carried out by secondary school and university teachers specialized in the subjects evaluated and with experience in university entrance exams, who have not participated in their preparation.

From the data collected with the cognitive tests and with the questionnaires and context of the students, different types of analysis will be carried out. In a first phase, primary descriptive analyzes of the available information will be carried out.

In a second phase, secondary analyzes will be carried out to allow a qualitative interpretation of the impact of the test model based on the different characteristics of the participating students.

The head of the National Evaluation area of ​​the National Institute for Educational Evaluation, Ruth Martínez, pointed out in Gijón after the test that next June there will be models of all the subjects that are going to enter the entrance test to the University in the year 2024.

Martínez considered that yesterday's is a competency test that consists of putting the students in front of "real, everyday" life situations, so that they have to apply the skills and not simply do a memory test.

As an example, he has indicated that in the mathematics test there are formulas that can be used, something that is already done in countries like Portugal and France, just as in the Latin test there is a glossary.

The one for Language, on the other hand, is based on integrating several texts, and not the usual one, which was a text with associated questions. In this new Language test, there are three texts in which an attempt is made to integrate these questions. As a novelty also, in the English test a Listening is included, which was not usually included in this matter, according to Martínez.