About the large-scale evaluation policy in Uruguay

Abstract

The paper presents a critical analysis of the large-scale evaluations applied in the Uruguayan educational system. Of a bibliographical nature, it takes as a reference the data provided both by the National Institute for Educational Evaluation’s (INEEd) Report on the State of Education in Uruguay in 2018, and official public electronic records on evaluation in education in the period 1996-2014. The results indicate that international learning assessment systems define contents that are organized according to market demands related to politics and that, in Uruguay, consequently, tests are aligned with government policies, moving away from politics, that is, territory policies. In essence, the educational system is perpetuated, configured, reproduced, and adjusted based on learning assessment results, which are sustained over time and can end up configuring the school curriculum. This practice, as a pedagogical device, installed and reified, postpones or nullifies a possible collective project that, in the best of cases, would promote a critical dialogue with the imposed system.