【明報專訊】The Incident

Ever since Hong Kong's handover, numerous ambitious projects have been carried out to fix an education system that has long been blamed for an uncreative and overly bookish generation. The Territory-wide System Assessment (TSA, 全港性系統評估) is certainly one of them.

Launched in 2004, the TSA, which tests students' abilities in Chinese, English and Mathematics, is taken by P3, P6 and S3 students. The government says the TSA provides information on students' strengths and weaknesses and is designed to help schools and teachers to improve their teaching programmes.

However, the assessment has become a way in which schools may prove their worth. Believing that a school's reputation hinges on its students' performance in the TSA, teachers force their students to do rounds and rounds of written exercises, putting them under great stress. According to a survey recently conducted by the Hong Kong Professional Teachers' Union (教協, PTU), a student on average finishes 22.8 TSA exercise books before he completes his primary education, up 46% on three years ago. And parents have complained about the severe pressure their children have come under.

To address these concerns, the government has recently suggested that, starting from this year, primary schools' and students' TSA results should no longer be made public. Under the new arrangement, schools will only be told how well their students as a whole have answered a particular question. The government hopes that this move will prevent schools from inappropriately comparing themselves with others.