- EGA is about to die. He's been killed. They have given the bells of death and have called the burial of all the people, as in the town square they bring the most evil criminal to the scaffold, prepare themselves to enmity with the people and burn, as it is known that the dead wolf does not bite.
The Procés case began five or six years ago, which was the chief prosecutor of the HABE Court and the single judge. It first began to be frightened that the EGA was the most difficult test of our people, that very few people exceeded it... Half the truth is the prelude to the great lies. Everything concerning EGA was said by those outside EGA and those responsible for EGA were silent because, in our opinion, they did not give us any possibility of defence against this HABE (Language Department) proceeding which is not acceptable at all. At the request of the Department of Education, concerned about the risks of burning fire around the Basque country and about the loyalty we had to the Department, we had not done so and so far we have not spoken a single word, even though we were plagued by the insides. Obviously, others did not have to keep that loyalty and, with the help of the newspapers, they have said and published everything that was in their interest in this effort to conquer or eliminate the EGA as soon as possible, and in the end, because it costs us a lot, they have achieved the treasure that was long dreamed of: Removing EGA and replacing the generated gap.
Now, in the last EGA, insulting our academic and professional capacity, some think that the efforts and works carried out in favor of EGA have been nothing but detriment, we are forced to defend the dignity of EGA and our academic capacity to more than 150,000 people possessing the document. Those half-truths that have been said, that become lies, to try to clarify them.
1.- Level of examination. Required capacity.
Both the Department of Education, Language and Culture and Euskaltzaindia and the Vice-Ministry of Linguistic Policy have stated that the EGA level, the C1 level of Europe, is a level that requires high linguistic communication. Competence is defined by the European Framework of Languages as follows:
User with level C1:
It is able to read a wide variety of extensive texts and with a certain level of demand, as well as recognize implicit meanings in them. It is able to express itself fluently and spontaneously without very evident samples of effort to find the right expression. You can use language flexibly and effectively for social, academic and professional purposes.
It is capable of producing clear, well-structured and detailed texts, as well as on complex issues, using the mechanisms for the organisation, articulation and cohesion of the text (common European reference framework) correctly. 2005 Translated into Basque by HABE).
We do not believe that in our country there are many tests with the same guarantees as EGA. He would like to have as many assurances as the EGA has for himself other tests
It goes without saying, therefore, that EGA is an analysis that requires great linguistic and communicative competence, that is, the ability to use language in many areas of formal and high use and in formal, concrete and complex communicative situations. The EGA is the competence that is required of our children’s teachers, broadcasters and journalists from the Basque media, the secretary who must draw up a court judgment in Euskera with great precision. What linguistic competence do the teachers of European countries and states, the journalists, the secretaries of the courts, the doctors who have to write the medical records? What kind of language models do we want for our children, young people and citizens? The professionals who use GABHS are professionals with great communication capacity.
2.- Only one in four approves.
The results obtained by our students in the communicative competence they have in Basque in the evaluations that have been carried out in the last decade in education are abundant. The results obtained by the students in the diagnostic and other evaluations carried out from eight to 16 years of age (those carried out by ISEI-IVEI and those carried out by PISA) have not been applauded and have been analysed on several occasions in Parliament.
ISEI-IVEI (Basque Institute of Evaluation and Research of the Irakas-Basque Institute of Evaluation and Research) in 2005 investigated the linguistic competence of ESO students, or rather, the communicative competence of students in Euskera, and concluded that: Only 47.3% of the 4th ESO students obtained level B2. Studies carried out since then by ISEI_IVEI and Pisa have not produced any better results. And they've measured reading, that is, passive capacity. What could these studies mean if they had measured creative skills, that is, written expression and oral expression?
As seen, the result of EGA confirms data from other evaluations and research carried out by the Department of Education.
EGA puts us in the mirror year after year and tells us that our Education System does not meet the goals that it repeatedly imposes on itself in its capacity to communicate in Basque. This hurts someone and prefers the messenger, EGA, finish before analyzing the situation and taking the path to putting the means.
3.- The prologue is the most diabolical devil of the akelarre.
It must be acknowledged that the Preamble does not at all times measure language proficiency and that it would be better to conduct oral and written tests on all examinations. However, this is not the case in recent years. EGA, year after year, more than 10,000 applicants have been submitted each year, and no one has been asked to exceed level B2, just be 17 or to do so in that year. Furthermore, the Department of Education has also been asked to carry out the oral and written tests on all examiners. The answer we have received is as follows: “Given the number of license plates and the resources we have, today it is impossible.” We, unfortunately, have never had the wealth and economic prosperity that HABE has had, we have not lived in the foam. We have not always been able to meet our academic criteria as we would like, because on many occasions they have not left us.
But we've done a lot of studies on the Preamble. Many in-depth studies with the University of the Basque Country. We analyzed each of the items in the Preamble. We have analyzed the ability to discriminate in the Preamble, the item bias, that is, if there is any item that excludes a student due to their dialect, first language, age or gender, and we have analyzed the existing correlations between the results of the Portal and the rest of the competencies. Capacity rates have been analysed on the basis of the results of the Preamble and it has been concluded that the Preamble perfectly represents the level of other competences. After repeated analysis, we found that the number of GABHS overruns among those who just exceed the Preamble does not reach 10% and that the overrun rate reaches 75% among those who easily exceed the Preamble. And we have convinced the European institutions that if there is no other option, if there are no economic resources, the Preamble is a very fair resource. We are therefore proud that our Preamble has been the fairest study of every year when over 10,000 examiners have not had the opportunity to do oral and written. Is HABE going to conduct a full, written and oral examination of all these thousands and thousands of people?
4. - What guarantee does EGA have?
EGA has been a member of ALTE (AssociationofLanguageTesters in Europe) since 2007. Within the ALTE are, inter alia, the following review bodies: Cambridge Assessmen tEnglish, Cervantes, Goethe Institut, Centre Internationaled´etudes Pedagogiques, Universita di Perugia (Italy), 36 institutions representing the Government of Navarra, the Generalitat of Catalonia and the 26 European languages.
Transfer to the patílum of the only examination with the European Quality Certificate
ALTE has among its functions to ensure the quality, reliability and equity of the tests carried out by the members of the organization. ALTE guarantees, in two words, that the level of competence required by the tests carried out by its members is the same in all languages, what is requested in Basque, what is requested in English, what is requested in French or what is requested in German, for example, are the same. For this purpose, review societies must comply with 14 standards and approve the audit every five years. In this audit, the organisations must demonstrate that their examination is the level that indicates, in the case of EGA C1; that the examinations carried out are the same as the call for tenders; that the examinations are of sufficient quality; and that the examiners' evaluation work is sufficiently accurate and reliable, among other things. For this purpose, EGA prepares and analyzes and makes all necessary changes before performing the examination. Once the analysis is carried out, it performs exhaustive analysis of the results to verify in the calls that the level of demand is similar, applying corrective measures if not; it also analyzes empirically and systematically the work of the examiners and each of the examiners demonstrates by means of data that the work performed in each call is reliable. EGA performs all these works in all the calls and presents the results of all them in ALTE. As a result of all this, EGA has the European Quality Certificate Q since 2010 and in December 2016 we have been ratified this European Quality Certificate Q. We do not believe that in our country there are many tests with the same guarantees as EGA. He would like to have as many guarantees as the EGA has for himself. What hidden reasons, therefore, are behind this irrational attempt to send the single international, European quality test to the potato? How is it understood that the Department of Education has also prohibited the publication in the press of the European Quality Certificate Q of EGA since 2010?
Finally, we want to ask ourselves a few questions:
Is the EGA problem? In our humble opinion, the EGA and the tests carried out in our country for the recognition of linguistic competence show us the reality. Ignoring and ignoring this reality, however hard it may be, is not good either for our language or for our society. It is time to analyse the situation, speak quietly and take action, and not behind the back, ignoring and leading to the hoax the only examination with the European quality certificate. Let us not forget that we, the Basques, as well as the other peoples, also need good, dignified and solid language models, both in education and in the media and in many other professions. The EGA examiners have always tried to carry out our work with dignity and raise it to the level of any professional from other peoples. Therefore, we will not tolerate the recognition of EGA and the hundreds of professionals we have worked on it not losing capacity and reputation.
We have been condemned to death without giving us the opportunity to defend ourselves, but we are proud of the work done. And since September the assumption by HABE of the responsibility of level C1 will not mean that suddenly the Euskera level of the examiners is improved, and if the results improve, we know that they will improve, because it is a political decision, it will not be because the level of those who have presented to the examination has improved considerably, but because HABE will significantly lower the level of demand. The future says so.