From 2010, first-year university students at most institutions and in most faculties will write the National Benchmarking Test (NBT) to measure competence in the key cognitive skills.
The NBT will be taken in some institutions - like the University of Cape Town (UCT) - before registration, and in others - like the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) - during the first few weeks of term. It replaces a variety of tests that institutions have separately administered, though some institutions and faculties will still run their own tests.
However, all institutions involved in the NBT stress that it will not be used for placement, but to determine the needs of students for academic support.
The NBT was piloted this year by UCT professor Nan Yeld on behalf of Higher Education SA, which administered the test to 13 000 students at seven institutions. The results revealed a shocking lack of competence, especially in mathematics. (See "Out for the count".)
"The plan is for all applicants to higher education to write the NBTs eventually, if the results prove beneficial for the system," says Yeld.
The test covers three areas: academic literacy (the ability to read, comprehend and express in the medium of instruction); quantitative literacy (the ability to solve problems of a quantitative nature in real contexts); and mathematics, based on the National Senior Certificate (NSC), or matric, curriculum.
The University of Stellenbosch has used its own test for more than 10 years, and since last year the results have counted 40% towards admission.
Duncan Hindle - We need to be convinced NBT is a credible test
A consortium of seven health science faculties - Wits, UCT, Stellenbosch, Free State, KwaZulu Natal, Walter Sisulu and Pretoria - will also continue to run their Health Sciences Placement Test (HSPT), which for many years has been used as an additional admission tool. At Wits, for instance, the HSPT counts 40% towards admission for health science degrees. The same weighting is given to the NSC. In addition, a 20% weighting is given to factors such as suitability of the candidates for the profession.
Even though testing as part of admission conditions is not new at SA universities, the prospect of a standardised test such as the NBT, which threatens to replace the NSC as a requirement for university access, has stirred huge political controversy.
Department of basic education director-general Duncan Hindle says: "We would need to be convinced about the need for additional testing. We need to be shown where the NSC is not adequate, and we need to be convinced that the NBT is a credible test. In the end we run the NSC at huge expense... is it really justifiable to introduce something else?" Deputy director-general Penny Vinjevold says the NBTs "will start to churn up the system", especially if written in September, before the NSC. "What will they be used for?" she asks.
The chair of parliament's portfolio committee on basic education, Fatima Ismail Chohan, who last week asked Yeld to give a presentation on the NBTs, said "the gatekeeping issues worry me a great deal. If we are saying that maths at a matric level is not at a high-enough level, there is a problem. Ideally, we want a single assessment to inform the extent to which a student will cope at university or college."
Minister of higher education Blade Nzimande is adamant that access to higher education should be broadened, not narrowed.
In an interview with the FM last month, Nzimande said that even students who did not attain an NSC university pass should be given "a second chance".
By law, universities are entitled to set other criteria for admission in addition to the NSC.
The stage has been set for an especially robust debate.
