@4wd: I was talking to a school head the other day who was saying that it has (apparently) been pointed out by many serious educationalists that PRE (Points Rating Evaluation) has been around in various guises in the schools/education system and in business HR personnel assessment/evaluation processes for donkeys' years, so most people are likely to have been subjected to it at some point in their lives - though they might not necessarily have been aware of it at the time. A classic example might be streaming in schools.
According to a senior retired officer and psychiatrist from the UK military with whom I had some dealings with a few years back, it's (PRE is) only half of the equation and that VA (Vocational Aptitude) testing/assessment/guidance is likely to be potentially of greater significance and use than (say) subject grades. For max productivity and happiness, you apparently have to try to fit people to those roles for which they have the relevant vocational aptitude and an appropriate and relevant minimum functional IQ. Apparently people with an IQ of less than 80 (I think it was) can't be trained - can't retain the learning - for anything. He also told me that the military (especially the Army) are the only organisations who seem to be able to get it right
most of the time - and that's largely because they have such tremendous experience of doing it and such a tremendous vested interest in the outcome, because they absolutely
have to get it right. I know from hiring training/experience that if a job applicant has had military training, then that's another useful tick in the box of desirable attributes that can positively differentiate a candidate.
The school head reckoned that a lot of problems can tend to occur in society when the touchy-feely brigade start to water down the PRE scheme or educational standards, or start to dumb things down, or break the measurement rules, to avoid potentially sensitive or even "disadvantaged" students (or their parents) getting their precious feelings hurt by them being assigned a low score, or something. Apparently, schools in NZ have moved away from the more traditional and tried-and-tested knowledge-based educational model. She pointed me to an interesting body of research on the subject. She thought this was perhaps one of the potentially adverse consequences to society of everybody having to be regarded as being equal, etc.,regardless, in what is becoming an increasingly prevalent politically correct post-truth environment.
Of course, that esteemed German leader and head of the progressive German National Socialist party might have had something to say about that.
