ABSTRACT

There are numerous excellent reasons for making use of primary-school marks or teachers' judgements of their pupils instead of, or at least as a supplement to, external tests or examinations. There is ample psychological evidence of the inability of any human judge to keep separate his assessments of intellectual traits from those of moral or social traits. The Chief Education Officer for Bournemouth recently pointed out that, if selection was based largely on teachers' estimates, there was a danger that present-day complaints about tests would be replaced by still more violent complaints about favouritism and victimization by teachers. In several areas there is no formal scaling of primary-school estimates, and yet the grammar-school heads and education officers who decide which children to admit rely largely on statements regarding suitability made by the primary heads in their catchment district. No particular system is laid down for the examination of these border-zone cases.