Up to and including Monday, the Landelijk Aktie Komitee Scholieren (LAKS) has received a record number of 285,700 complaints about the final exams. The first period came to an end on this day with the Spanish, Turkish, Frisian, Russian and Arabic exams at havo and vwo.
Last year’s record (212,000) was already broken last Tuesday. With 129,000, the leader in the number of complaints is the category ‘the exam is too difficult’. Many complaints were about texts that were too long and complicated, the use of words that were too difficult, but also about assignments that did not match the material covered in the lessons.
The record is not unexpected, says coordinator of the final exam complaints line Sarah Broekmeulen. “Pupils are getting better at finding us, also with substantive complaints. It’s great to see that in some cases complaining really made sense.”
Poor preparation
The LAKS had to deal with a lot of organizational complaints. These concerned, among other things, the inadequate preparation for the exams due to the corona period, errors in the assignments that were not reported or reported too late and noise pollution. “Our team then called the schools to get a story. Fortunately, many schools recognized what had gone wrong and promised to get better,” says Broekmeulen.
On June 9, most exam candidates who have taken all their exams in the first period will hear the results. In total, more than 188,000 students took exams this year. In VMBO this was 92,000 pupils, in HAVO almost 55,000 pupils and in VWO almost 41,000 pupils.
The number of complaints is likely to rise further. From 13 to 24 June is the second period in which candidates can take the exam or resit. The option to spread out was introduced to give students the opportunity to prepare a little longer after the corona period.
In special education complaints about procedures
The Pupil Interest of Secondary Special Education (LBVSO) informs that pupils from special education mainly have complaints about the procedures surrounding their examinations. The state exam in which these students participate consists of first a written part and then an oral part. The grade for the written part is only given to the students after the oral part.
This can lead to lower results, according to LBVSO chairman Elijah Delsink. Understanding the mistakes made during the written part can help students improve the oral part, he explains.
D66 recently asked parliamentary questions about the issue. Minister of Education Dennis Wiersma said that he found it “very annoying” for the students, because he understands “that it is important for them to know what result has been achieved for the central written exam before the oral exams start”. According to Wiersma, the subject has been included in the so-called ‘state exam improvement agenda’ and it is being examined whether, for example, the planning can be adjusted in the future.