Considering that:
The international technobureaucracies which run the credit agencies impose educational assessment policies centred on the results of standardised tests. Such tests introduce commercial logic into public education systems.
The objective of these meritocratic and punitive assessments is to introduce regulations which allow the resources intended for education to be directed in a focalised manner and make teachers exclusively responsible for the results obtained by students in quantitative measurements.
The said tests are incapable of assessing educational processes in their entirety and complexity, including the variable of the effectiveness of education policies, the responsibility of the State.
The results of the assessments do not give rise to public policies which, through concrete actions, guarantee overcoming the difficulties detected and participation by education workers in the analysis of teaching and institutional practices which sustain the educational process.
Even in some countries which are making serious efforts to guarantee the right to lifelong education for all, attempts are being observed to drive forward technocratic assessment policies, contracting external consultants and thus diverting substantial resources which should be used to improve quality.
It is recommended that:
The procedures for integral assessment of education form an essential part of the educational process in all its dimensions and must sustain policies which guarantee quality education. The said procedures must include:
Monitoring of education policies and their impact on teacher cover and completion, repetition, drop-out and over-aged students rates. The pursuance of policies must be accompanied by a social audit mechanism: observatories, advisory councils, etc., made up of trade union organisations of education workers and education communities.
Assessment of the administrative management of education systems: appointment of teachers, competitions and teacher cover through replacements. Occupational health measures for education workers. Strategic planning of the construction, upkeep and maintenance of schools and guarantee of compliance with health and safety regulations in school establishments. These aspects must be included in collective bargaining in the sector.
Institutional assessment at school level: must be permanent, collective, systematic, and formative, not punitive. It is necessary to evaluate pedagogical, didactic and institutional practices; then mechanisms must be included for the participation of families and students in the assessment of institutional practices. The results will lead to specific intervention policies to improve each indicator.
Classroom level: the assessment of the quality of teaching must be systematic, permanent and daily and its instruments multiple and combined. Standardised tests can make a contribution to the diagnosis if indicators are constructed which take account of the realities of educational action and if they do not include a meritocratic, competitive and entrepreneurial logic.