Una mirada hacia las dinámicas institucionales.

In this section, the focus will be to provide evidence of existing pressure regarding assessment from the available literature.

Nazeer (2006) explored a cooperative learning approach to teaching and learning Economics in secondary schools and investigated teachers‘ perception of cooperative learning. In his study, the nature of the teachers‘ exam-oriented teaching reflected on the way they were pressured to produce good results. He highlighted the importance of private tuition, which is an effect of the race of competition between students and among parents. For instance, he found out many parents believed that they needed to send their children to private tuition in order to get good results from schools. As a result, some parents started sending their young children to these classes as soon as their children start primary schooling. Further, he also pointed out the competitive nature of the Maldivian students against each other. ―Although we encourage our children to learn Islamic cooperative values at home, in schools we teach them to be individualistic or competitive against fellow students to get high marks‖ (Nazeer, 2006, p. 102).

explored, ―the route taken by an urban primary school in the Republic of Maldives‖. During his study, he discovered assessment of student learning was given a high accord by staff at all levels, particularly by the head of the school. Therefore, the principal personally monitored the performance of the students by reviewing weekly results of the assessments given to students in the presence of all the teachers and supervisors.

In another study carried out in three schools by Shareef (2010) on Environmental education in the Maldives at the primary level, found out that in the Maldivian education system, a lot of pressure is imposed on the schools to prepare students for the external examination they sit at the end of secondary schooling. Therefore, attaining good results in the Cambridge IGCSE is a highly regarded achievement. Additionally, there was a lot of competition between parents, even at the primary level and that parents took exam results very seriously. He also reported that in the island school parents put a lot of pressure on teachers regarding marks. For example, it was very common for parents to complain about teachers not being consistent in marking (Shareef, 2010).

Haveeruonline (2011), a renowned newspaper of Maldives, reported a case of three invigilators being arrested from a rural school (Shaviyani Atoll Milandhoo School) in the Maldives, for helping students plagiarize answers at Cambridge IGCSE Ordinary Level Mathematics examination

in 2010. The Cambridge examiners found some suspicious identical answers for several questions and suspected deception in the International Examination that year. As a result, the University penalized Sh. Milandhoo School‘s O‘ level candidates by not proceeding with the grading process in the Mathematics papers.

More recently, Adam‘s (2012) study on Maldivian primary teachers‘ mathematical beliefs and practices also found that teachers placed pressure on the assessment results of the students. He noticed the impact of assessment pressure affecting teachers‘ instructional practice in Mathematics teaching. In fact, this pressure encouraged the teachers to focus each lesson on materials that would provide practice for the tests. Adam also highlighted that there was lots of pressure from the parents and the schools to improve test results. Consequently, the teachers were concerned about getting good results from the school tests and examinations (Adam, 2012).

Another recent study by Mariya (2012) on classroom practices and private tuition settings in the Maldives, shows evidence of all schools needing to create good results as there is a lot of pressure from the parents, the society and media. In that study, Mariya confirmed that education in the Maldives is exclusively examination-oriented and with the test results, students are always in competition with each other. She also highlights how parents supported tutoring and how they spent money

on tuition teachers. The anxious parents sent their children after the school hours to tuition classes to make their children get top grades at Cambridge IGCSE examinations because of the competition (Mariya, 2012).

Shifleen (2012) reported an interview by CHSE 2(Centre for Higher Secondary Education) Principal in Haveeruonline. According to the principal, the chance to study in that school is given to those children who have passed in four compulsory subjects and additional three subjects in the Cambridge IGCSE Ordinary Level. Therefore, those children who obtained the best grades are selected. The principal of CHSE gave reasons for the strict criteria of the selection procedures. It is because of the limited spaces and high demand from the students. The Principal said, ―Competition is immense at present, therefore, we need students who are excellent learners. If there are more children who want to join our school then we will select students using the National Award Criteria‖ (Shifleen, 2012).

Maajid (2012) strongly criticizes the current education system in the Maldives. According to Maajid, there is not a single aspect of our education system that is commendable at the present. Most importantly, Maldivian students who sit the Cambridge Ordinary Level Examinations

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Centre for Higher Secondary Education is the first and is still one of the biggest government high schools in the Maldives

are placed first, second or third in the world. In this way, he writes, ―Do those ―successes‖ really reflect the reality? Do they really mean that our students are the best in the world? Or, are they just superficial, meaningless decorations which do not take into account some real factors that matter?‖ Additionally, he believes this UK based examinations system conducts and places these top rankings ―first, second or third places in the world‖ only to the third-world countries. As these countries are exceptionally lazy and ignorant to conduct their own examination systems (Maajid, 2012).