3.

We might marvel¹ at the progress made in every field of study, but the methods of testing a person’s knowledge and ability remain as primitive² as ever they were. It really is extraordinary that after all these years, educationists have still failed to device anything more efficient and reliable than examinations. 我们可能对学科的每个领域所取得的进步感到大为惊异，然而测试一个人的知识和能力的方法依然原始如初。确实是令人吃惊，这么多年以后，教育家们还没有找到比考试更为有效和可靠的手段。

For all the pious³ claim that examinations test what you know, it is common knowledge that they more often do the exact opposite. They may be a good means of testing memory, or the knack⁴ of working rapidly under extreme pressure, but they can tell you nothing about a person’s true ability and aptitude⁵.考试就是测验你知道什么，对于所有这些虔诚的说法，普遍认为往往适得其反。考试可能是检验记忆力，或者在极度紧张的情况下发现快速工作窍门的好方法。但是它不能告诉你一个人的真正能力和智能究竟怎样。

       As anxiety-makers, examinations are second to none. That is because so much depends on them. They are the mark of success of failure in our society. Your whole future may be decided⁶ in one fateful day. It doesn’t matter that you weren’t feeling very well, or that your mother died. Little things like that don’t count: the exam goes on. No one can give of his best when he is in mortal terror, or after a sleepless⁷ night, yet this is precisely⁸ what the examination system expects him to do. 作为制造焦虑者，考试是最好的手段。这是因为它决定着很多事。它是一个人在社会中成功或失败的标志。在事关命运的一天里你的整个前途就被决定下来了。它不管你当时的心情很糟糕，或者你的母亲已去世。像那样的小事不足挂齿：考试依然进行。当身陷致命的恐惧中或经过一个无眠之夜后，没人能发挥出他的最佳水平，不过这正是考试制度期望他这样做的。

The moment a child begins school, he enters a world of vicious competition where success and failure are clearly defined and measured. Can we wonder at the increasing number of “drop-outs”: young people who are written off as utter failures before they have even embarked⁹ on a career? Can we be surprised at the suicide rate among students?从孩子开始上学的那一刻起，他就走进了一个成功和失败界限分明和可以衡量的恶毒竞争之中。我们会对数目不断增加的“辍学者”——甚至在年轻人开始事业之前认为他已完全失败——感到诧异吗？面对学生的自杀率我们能感到吃惊吗？

       A good education should, among other things, train you to think for yourself. The examination system does anything but that. What has to be learnt is rigidly¹⁰ laid down by a syllabus¹¹, so the student is encouraged to memorize. Examinations do not motivate a student to read widely, but to restrict his reading; they do not enable him to seek more and more knowledge, but induce cramming¹². 一种好的教育应当包括培养你独立的能力。而考试制度绝对没有这样的作用。必须学的东西被强硬地用课程大纲给制定出来，鼓励学生去死记。考试不能激励学生去广泛阅读，而是限制他阅读；考试不能使学生探索越来越多的知识，而是起到填鸭式的作用。

They lower the standards of teaching, for they deprive the teacher of all freedoms. Teachers themselves are often judged by examination results and instead of teaching their subjects, they are reduced to training their students in exam techniques which they despise. The most successful candidates are not always the best educated; they are the best trained in the technique of working under duress¹³. 考试促使降低教学标准，因为它剥夺了老师的一切自由。对老师本人教学水平的评判通常就是看学生的考试成绩。老师们不去教授他们的课，而是简化教学，对学生进行他们嗤之以鼻的考试技巧培训。最成功的投考者不总是知识水平最高者；他们是高压之下掌握考试技巧最老练者。

       The results on which so much depends are often nothing more than a subjective¹⁴ assessment¹⁵ by some anonymous¹⁶ examiner. Examiners are only human. They get tired and hungry; they make mistakes. Yet they have to mark stacks of hastily scrawled¹⁷ scripts in a limited amount of time. They work under the same sort of pressure as the candidates. And their word carries weight. After a judge’s decision you have the right of appeal, but not after an examiner’s. 众多因素所依赖的考试成绩只不过是某个匿名主考者的主观评价。主考官们都是人。他们会变累，会饥饿，还会出错。然而，他们不得不在有限的时间内为大队的匆匆草书的试卷判分。跟投考者一样，他们也在相同的压力之下工作，不过他们的话很有分量。在鉴定人鉴定之后，而不是主考官判卷后，你才有权提出查卷的申请。

There must surely be many simpler and more effective ways of assessing a person”s true abilities. Is it cynical¹⁸ to suggest that examinations are merely a profitable business for the institutions that run them? This is what it boils down to in the last analysis. The best comment on the system is this illiterate¹⁹ message recently scrawled on a wall: “I were a teenage drop-out and now I are a teenage millionaire.”评判一个人真实能力肯定有很多更简单和跟有效的方法。提出考试仅仅是经营考试机构获利的生意是否有点愤世嫉俗？这是最终分析得出的结论。对考试制度最好的评论是乱涂在墙上的这则没受过教育的一句话：“我曾是一个十几岁的辍学者，而现在我是一个十几岁的百万富翁。”