First-year university student Dias Nurlybekuly, from Astana IT University, states his experience with creativity, and how in the big picture, it matters more than the marks students are given.

“Why do they continue to measure success in school with dry numbers, if they long ago became a measure of the past? Many studies show that up to 70% of schoolchildren experience chronic stress because of grades and are afraid to fail at the most inappropriate moment. While we are clinging to “fives”¹ and “ones,”² the future demands completely different skills — flexibility of thinking, the ability to find non-standard paths and to create new things.

A grade is a measure of the past, creativity is a resource of the future.

The school system relies on a single scale for all subjects: from literature to physics. The focus is shifted to checking knowledge “by template”: every lesson, homework, and test are standardized to make the process of giving grades easier. Constant fear of failure leads to chronic stress and fear of making a mistake. Because of this, students study not for understanding of the subject, but for the number in the report card: when the greatest value is the mark, motivation turns into a race for numbers. As a result, many lose the ability to think flexibly, to consider a problem from different sides, and to invent their own solutions.

Burnout becomes the norm: fatigue, apathy, and loss of interest in study appear already in the lower grades. From personal experience: I saw how classmates cried after a test because of a couple of “twos”³ and even thought about transferring to another place or about skipping precisely those lessons in which they had bad grades. Adult life does not feed on ready-made algorithms from a textbook: in professions and startups, success is given only by the ability independently to find a way out of new situations. Dependence on flashcards “memorize – give back – get a grade” leaves many graduates unprepared for tasks where there is no clear instruction.

Creativity teaches to go beyond the usual and to look at a problem from an unusual angle. In a quickly changing world, the ability to adapt and to invent unique solutions is valued higher than any certificate. For example, a schoolboy from a neighboring city developed an application for safe movement in the yard, and his project received a grant for development from the local administration.

Alternative approaches to evaluation
• Portfolio and presentations of individual projects
• Self-assessment, when students discuss and evaluate each other’s works
• Hackathons, master classes, and project-based learning

Such formats stimulate responsibility for the result and encourage non-standard thinking instead of a dry race for numbers. Balance between numbers and creativity will allow preserving an objective evaluation of knowledge and at the same time developing skills of the 21st century. Schools should begin with test projects: to allocate separate courses or classes where the usual tests will be replaced with creative assignments and group presentations.

Only in this way will we stop cultivating a generation of performers and come out to a new level of education, where every child will be able to realize his unique potential.”

Written by Dias Nurlybekuly, Astana IT University, Software Engineering

Translated by Evelina Mamedova, Editor-in-Chief of The Momentum Report

1. In the Kazakstan grading system, maximum grade possible, equivalent to an “A” . ↩︎
2. In the Kazakstan grading system, minimum grade possible, equivalent to an “F” . ↩︎
3. Kazakstan generally observes a grading system of 5 being the maximum and 1 being the minimum possible grade. ↩︎