The Assessment-Policy Nexus: Reforming National Standards for Global Excellence

Abstract

The connection between the evaluation practices and the policy reforms in this systematic review falls under the national standards development framework towards global excellence loyalty. It looks at the international test high profile which are the PISA and TIMSS as a check of the quality of the education system and a testing tool of achieving better outcomes in terms of both, literacy, numeracy and science. The review identifies the critical nature of globalization in evoking the countries to align their education systems with those of the rest of the world particularly in STEM education. It also talks about the challenges that a country undergoes when trying to align its curriculum effectively, mostly due to the absence of teacher training and professional development, which makes the enactment of reforms difficult. In addition, the review offers the sense of evidence-based policymaking in which assessment data is employed to cause certain interventions to facilitate on-going shifts in education. It discusses the challenge of translation of policy-to-practice, especially institutional resistance and political ideologies, which used UK as an example and other countries. A portion of the reforms in the higher education accreditation systems that is in the current system that is being reviewed includes the reconfiguration towards binary accreditation systems as an attribute to improve transparency and global competitiveness. Though various significant challenges continue, the results demonstrate that the systems of national countries were brought closer to international standards dramatically. The review is concluded by the suggestions that appear to be practical such as the adjustment of the curricula to the international assessment, investment in STEM-education, training of educators, and the encouragement of international collaboration towards enhancing the educational practices in the global learning sphere.