Internal Assessment in Senior Secondary Schools in Rivers State: Implications for the Teacher Counsellor

Amongst the responsibilities of the teacher as a stakeholder at all levels of education is the proper assessments of his clients to enable him give accurate feedback to the public. Assessment and in fact the internal type is viewed very seriously by providers of education including government. In the secondary school, assessment is carried out in different ways by different personnel but the question is how do these personnel with different skills applied aggregate the result to have the accurate feedback desired. This paper discusses the preparation, administration and control of internal assessment in secondary schools and the implication for the teacher. Even with a test prepared by a test expert, in the hand of an unscrupulous or the well-meaning but uninformed user, a test can hazardous. Therefore, advancing the procedures and technicalities of preparation and administration of internal assessment in such a way that confounding variables will be minimized if not totally checked, this paper laid emphasis on its control to achieve the much-desired quality assurance and quality control (QA QC). Consequently, suggestions were made which includes basic training for intending teachers, mandatory in-service training and/or workshop exclusively to groom teachers on testing and measurement, and the establishment of examination committees in school, whose membership must have requisite knowledge of testing.