The Heavy Shadow of High Stake Testing on Schools: Iranian English Teachers’ Perspectives

It appears that University Entrance Exam (UEE) as a high stake test plays a key role in addressing many aspects of the educational system. This paper aimed to portray teachers’ perspectives regarding UEE and to investigate the differences between Iranian high school English teachers’ perspectives regarding their demographic features. In order to reach the goals, a short version of The Teacher’s High Stakes Testing Survey originally developed by Hope, Brockmeier, Lutfi, and Sermon (2006) with six constructs including curriculum, teaching, work satisfaction, stress, accountability, and students was distributed among 51 Iranian English teachers working at different high schools in Gorgan and Mashhad, Iran. The results showed that teachers’ perspectives had the highest mean in student domain and the lowest mean in work satisfaction. Moreover, no significant difference was found between teachers’ perceptions regarding their gender, age, degree as well as teaching experience

Keywords:

High Stake Test , Teachers’ Perceptions , University Entrance Examination