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Debate Info

19
18
Yes No
Debate Score:37
Arguments:28
Total Votes:37
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Argument Ratio

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 Yes (16)
 
 No (11)

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Srom(12206) pic



Are exams the best way to decide who are the best students in a school?

Yes

Side Score: 19
VS.

No

Side Score: 18
2 points

While not perfect, there is no better way to evaluate students. If students truly are bright and want to succeed, they will find a way to adapt to the exam system.

Side: Yes

Very true.

Side: Yes
PookaWooka(173) Disputed
1 point

Exams test your ability to be trained like a pet monkey to perform tricks on demand over and over until one day a new form of that performance comes along that is to be improvised and is 90% repeating past performed tricks just to grab an A*.

Side: No
Troy8(2433) Disputed
1 point

Exam questions aren't "tricks". They test your ability to show your knowledge of the valuable lessons taught over the course of a year (or half year). I don't really understand your point to be honest.

Side: Yes
2 points

Taking debates from DDO without permission is intellectual property theft. Stealing makes baby Jesus cry.

Side: Yes
1 point

I know, right? .

Side: Yes
Srom(12206) Disputed
1 point

My brother KillerBee made a debate about how I was doing this and people were saying that I can do this to provide debates. Plus people are saying it's fine because there have been boring debate topics going about around here.

Side: No
Atrag(5666) Disputed
1 point

Ah I see. So its fine to steal as long as people want it.

Side: Yes

Yes. Though it does not point out who is the most intelligent. it definitely points out who are the hardest working students.

Me for example: I learned everything that came may why. I took gratuitous amounts of notes even, but I hardly ever did the actual school work. I did not want to put the effort into it therefor I could not be one of the best students...

Side: Yes
bobbyjohn(44) Disputed
1 point

Yes the definition of a student is someone who is studying a field/topic and exams test if the student actually learned the content. But in the real world the perfect scenario are students who can learn the material but be able to apply it to some degree. Most times students don't get the chance to apply the knowledge on exams.

But i think truly learning a topic/field is understanding the terms and having the knowledge on the field but it is also to branch out and make connections of the field with other topics , i think this is true learning and hence i believe exams are not the best way to determine the best students.

Check my argument under the No side and you will see what alternative i thought of.

Side: No
2 points

Yeah. I agree with you, by the end of typing up my post I started thinking..."uh oh" this really does not point out who the best students are, but it gives the illusion of who the best students are.

Side: No

I think its the worst way. Yes some students will do well, some of them completely understand the material, concepts and requirements. These students are usually of a particular learning type and have adapted well to the system in which they are taught. Others, who do not test well are not necessarily less bright, on the contrary most of them extremely intelligent, creative and innovative (which is what our society needs, innovators) however they don't often successfully conform to the system in which they are forced. If the test is to decide who is the best reciter of information an exam would be able to decide that. If you want test for who is the smartest an exam will not find them.

Side: No
Troy8(2433) Disputed
2 points

Unfortunately being smart is not going to help you as much in life as being able to work hard and apply what you've learned. Therefore exams should not be testing for the smartest students, but rather the hardest working and most dilligent.

Side: Yes

Right. Because hard work and diligence is what gets you through life.

An IQ of 30000 won't get you anywhere if you don't do or know anything.

Side: Yes
Intangible(4934) Disputed
1 point

But still, what is another way that they could decide who the best students are?

You can point out all of the flaws, but if you don't present a better way(or even another way) then we can conclude that the exam system is the best way.

Side: Yes
sauh(1106) Disputed
1 point

The question isn't "are test the best way to decide who the smartest kids are"; the question is "... To decide who the best students are".

The qualifications of being a good student is being able to understand material, concepts and requirements; and the way to check this is to give an exam. So the best students are the ones that can confirm to the system and recite information back.

Therefore test are useful to determine which "students" are better than others at being "students".

Side: Yes
3 points

I was the best student the world ever knew and I fucked some of my exams up, no lies.

Side: No
Troy8(2433) Disputed
1 point

Alright whatever you say troll. The best student wouldn't mess up.

Side: Yes
PookaWooka(173) Disputed
3 points

Einstein got F's in most subjects and a D in physics before dropping out of school.

Mozart completely failed his education and became a prostitute for a period of his life before becoming the best student of music the world has ever known.

No one's perfect.

Side: No
1 point

The best way would be to have an interview with the teacher while the teacher puts questions toward you, you answer them but say your thought process out loud. The question should also be harder and more practical than the content learned but still requires the content learned in school. This way the teacher knows who is the smartest as opposed to look at a multiple choice exam where the person could have guessed half of them.

This is a more accurate way of finding out whether a student is 'smart' but not efficient as it would take a long time for the teacher to go through most of the content with each student.

Side: No
bobbyjohn(44) Clarified
1 point

The question should be a thinking question as well something that requires a bit of creativity. And maybe the student can get about 20 minutes to prepare the answer alone in the room to the teacher.

Side: Yes

The problem with this is. You are forgetting that the teacher may just be one of the average people as well so they would not be able to interpret accurately whether the student is bright or not.

I could give a teacher the most well thought out and creative response, but if they are not smart enough themselves then they will not even comprehend it and call it wrong.

And like you said this would take a long time and there other classes that you need to go to so this still would not be the best way for it could not even be done.

Side: Yes
1 point

Yea i understand what you are saying, even now some teachers don't really know what they are teaching half of the time lol

Side: Yes
Intangible(4934) Disputed
1 point

And also the best students would be the one that followed the system and got the best grades within the system because that is how the system works...sadly

Now if a different school system was made...for specifically those students who are creative then that would be superb, but in a normal school system the exams are the best way to go.

Side: Yes
1 point

i think no because students honestly cant be botherd to study at home as much as they do at school also it depends on the environment the student is living in

Side: No

Actually, no.. You can always have tests which decide a student's academic excellence

Side: No