Examining the exam

I’ve been wondering…                                     

Is it me or does the word ‘exam’ sound scary? Have you ever noticed the interesting reaction of students when it’s time for exams? Each time the word is
mentioned it’s as if students have been sentenced to death or paranoia.

Every stage in academia requires
assessment. More interesting is that of the universities in Ghana. Dear exam seems to always arrive when he is not welcomed
and always takes students by surprise. Yet vacation and holidays are always late in
arriving at the doorsteps of the university student.

Why is exam an unwanted guest in every hostel, hall or home? Is it the delight in serving its host with a delicious meal of crammed lessons from different lectures or
the opportunity to be a mind reader (trying to determine which question the lecturer would ask); sleepless nights, the compulsory fasts or the hard chairs that
give the buttocks stroke from excessive sitting?

Whether it’s a test which flows like a living spring in UCC or mid-semester exams written like BECE in KNUST or assignments like that of a military man in war as done in UG, exam is NEVER welcome yet a ‘necessary evil’. How many lecturers and examiners have been shot, bombed, knifed, gang robbed and died in the
imaginary eyes of students who were ‘rocked’ and blown away by papers?

Mr. Exams seems to be a destroyer of both students and lecturers and it needs to be examined…

Just thinking…