Report on ECE exam: World Conflicts Since 1900

The Excelsior College exam on World Conflicts Since 1900 has not received notice here yet.

Rather new (August?), the exam aims to assess learning for an introductory international relations course. It ought to prove popular with liberal arts and military students alike.

The content is divided into three equal portions: theory, historical case studies, and contemporary issues. The sample exam consists of 24 questions, but the three hour exam itself 130. Like other ECE multiple choice exams, there are four answers provided for each item. The recommended textbook is a single one by Joseph Nye.

Since my sample results yeilded 92% correct, I sat the exam after only a brief review of most the unfamiliar material found via the world wide web. I completed the exam in about 100 minutes. The results, however, proved disappointing: 79% correct and only a 'B.' Just one content area was less than 80% - but I'm guessing that 80% is the magic cut-off for an 'A'. It sure can't be 75%!

What happened? Apparently the situation resembles CLEP's American Government exam where the range measured on the exam is exceptionally wide and only the very very highest score can make the top cut.

"World Conflicts" proved surprising because while the sample exam questions are nicely specific, the actual exam is not, using many single sentence questions or a sentence followed by a stem and answers. The sample nicely follows the topics listed in the outline, indicated the breadth and depth of understanding expected. By contrast, the actual exam is too frequently ambiguous. For example, one actual exam question concerns how a state differs from an ethnic group. Eliminating the distractors, the two anwers were "an ethnic group can be a nation" and "a nation can be a state." How does this answer the question?

Now, the above answer obviously turns on a technicality not readily apparent to the layman. Both appear to be correct, yet both can't be. Whether or not abiguities like the above one will change through reading the textbook I will not not know unless I decide to crack it and retest. But since it is a worthy classic, it may be fun to try and find out.

 

I took this exam back in 2009, and posted some free study resources on my blog here: Challenge It!: Excelsior College's World Conflicts Since 1900 Exam

Orson, in regard to the nation question, the correct answer would be, "an ethnic group can be a nation," since "nation" refers to a group of people rather than a political body (this might easily be confused with "nation state").