Improving Armenia’s Unified Entrance Exam with Computer-Based Testing

The UEE plays a vital role in Armenia’s education system. This year alone, over 4,300 high school students will take the high-stakes exam, which decides whether they graduate from secondary school, and which higher-education institution they are admitted to. The Assessment and Testing Center oversees the UEE as well as large-scale national and international assessments in Armenia.

Armenia has focused on improving the overall efficiency of UEE administration, increasing public confidence, and improving test quality. After assessing needs, costs, challenges, and risks of various approaches (under the first Russia Education Aid for Development (READ) Trust Fund program), Armenia has committed to a gradual introduction of computer-based testing for the UEE under the READ Trust Fund.

Currently, a READ grant is supporting the design and piloting of computer-based testing in mathematics, a core UEE subject. The focus is on ensuring alignment of the computer-based test with both the State Standard for education and State Standard for mathematics curriculum. The second stage of the computer-based UEE pilot commenced in February 2018, covering over 700 students in the capital city of Yerevan who took both paper- and computer-based tests.

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Photo credit: Arevik Badalyan / World Bank