As higher education continues to become more important globally, many international experts say it may be time to test how much students are actually learning while in college.  

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, an international think-tank based in Paris, has a plan to accomplish this goal. 

The OECD said it would test students at higher education institutions around the world and then rank individuals, countries and universities globally.  

The plan, known as the Assessment of Higher Education Learning Outcomes, would test students’ knowledge of economics and engineering, as well as generic skills through hypothetical problem-solving exercises. 

The test would have many goals, but according to the OECD’s website, OECD.org, the test could help higher education institutions learn their strengths and weaknesses.  

Carrie Zelna, Director of the Office of Assessment at N.C. State, agrees that academic assessment is a critical part of improving higher education. 

“The importance of academic assessment is, very clearly to me, all about improving and enhancing the academic experience for students so they learn what it is we feel like they should be learning in a particular curriculum,” Zelna said.  

The ALEHO exam would not be the first standardized test the OECD has administered.  The Program for International Student Assessment, first introduced in 1997, tests mathematics, science and reading amongst 15-year-old students around the world.  They have tested them every three years since implementation and then ranked every participating country accordingly in each of the academic areas. 

For higher education, however, testing may prove more difficult, and the OECD itself admitted that there could be some issues.

“Constructing an assessment that is valid across institutions, cultures and disciplines presents numerous scientific and practical challenges,” it said on its website.  “Amongst these are how to take account of the institutions; differences between national systems of higher edvucation; variations in the duration and content of programs; cultural and linguistic diversity; and the accounting for the value added by institutions.” 

Andreas Schleicher, the OECD’s chief education advisor, said that he thinks the test could still be successful.

“We had great doubts that it would be possible to develop a test that works across languages and cultures,” Schleicher said in an interview with The New York Times.  “Now we believe it is possible.”

Shreye Saxena, a junior in electrical and computer engineering at N.C State, said he could see many possible issues with an international standardized test.

“The problem with standardized tests is that they hold all universities to the same metrics for success,” Saxena said.  

Saxena said every university has its own set of goals, and generic testing could be the wrong way to assess performance.

“It is comparing apples to oranges, and unfairly so,” Saxena said.  “I would wager that N.C. State would place very high on the ALEHO assessment, while Wake Forest may place lower.  It implies that Wake Forest is a ‘worse’ institution, or that their students aren’t receiving as good of an education, when that is clearly not the case.”

Zelna said that it could be possible for there to be some problems with an international test, but that she didn’t want to jump to any negative conclusions about OECD’s methods without more information.  If this test were to be implemented, she said that her concern would be about how it could help the university.

“For me, what matters the most is our ability to use that data on campus to be able to talk about our programs and how we’re doing,” Zelna said.  

Zelna said some testing organizations just release an overall score to the university.  She said that generalized data like that does not help much, but more detailed results could be used to address specific areas of the educational process.

“If we’re going to ask you, the student, to take a test, I want, as an assessor, to be able to do something with that information on campus,” Zelna said.  

Zelna said that test-taking can be very difficult for some students, and therefore hopes that if this test is implemented it would help universities become better at what they do.

“I would want this test to be meaningful at N.C. State,” Zelna said. 

While a number of organizations currently rank the world’s universities, most of them base their rankings on research.  ALEHO hopes to specifically assess teaching and learning.

Saxena said he does not know how AHELO will be able to truly accomplish that.

“Someone who got a 2,400 on the SAT and went to Harvard will probably do well on the test, but it is very difficult to say that Harvard is the reason why that person did well rather than [having] an intrinsic skill set,” Saxena said.  “A much better indicator of institutional strength could be comparing [a] student’s scores from the day they enter college to the day they graduate.”

As it turns out, N.C. State already has plans for something like that.

The Office of Assessment is exploring a program called General Education Assessment that gauges students’ writing, reading, math and critical thinking skills.  This could allow the university to track trends and evaluate some strengths and weaknesses.   

General Education Assessment is still in the pilot phase, but ideally it could eventually test the same students as freshmen and seniors, and thus provide more exact data on teaching and learning here. 

Meanwhile, the OECD said it will make a final decision on whether to move forward with the AHELO program in November.