OECD Reviews of Evaluation and Assessment in Education: North Macedonia
How can assessment and evaluation policies work together more effectively to improve student outcomes in primary and secondary schools? The country reports in this series analyse major issues facing evaluation and assessment policy to identify improvements that can be made to enhance the quality, equity and efficiency of school education.
The Republic of North Macedonia has made remarkable progress in expanding access to education and strengthening institutional capacity. Yet, the majority of young Macedonians leave school without mastering the basic competencies for life and work and students’ background continues to influence performance. This review, developed in cooperation with UNICEF, provides North Macedonia with recommendations to help strengthen its evaluation and assessment system, by moving towards a system where assessment provides students with helpful feedback to improve learning. It will be of interest to North Macedonia, as well as other countries looking to make more effective use of their evaluation and assessment system to improve quality and equity, and result in better outcomes for all students.
Raising learning outcomes through student assessment
This chapter looks at how the assessment system of the Republic of North Macedonia measures and shapes student learning. Classroom assessments are not based on established, national learning standards, and therefore do not convey reliable and meaningful information on student achievement. Teachers predominantly rely on summative assessment practices, which are limited to a narrow range of lower-order tasks, thereby providing students with little quality feedback. This chapter suggests that North Macedonia develop national learning standards to provide students with more consistent and accurate information of their attainment. It will also be critical to support and encourage formative assessment practices to support teachers monitor student learning.