State Control of Compulsory Education through the National Achievement Test : A Critical Examination of its Legality(<Special Issue>Academic Achievement Policies and Schools)

The national achievement test has been carried out in Japan since 2007. In this paper, I consider the legality of the national achievement test referring to the Supreme Court decision in the Hokkaido National Achievement Test case (1976). In this case, the Supreme Court examined the legality of the national achievement test carried out by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) in the 1960s and permitted MEXT to carry out such tests under the following conditions. (1) MEXT can implement the national achievement test, if the purpose of exercising such a test is not beyond the tasks of MEXT. (2) Although MEXT can give advice to improve the education practices, it should not control the educational practices which are delegated to each school based on the test's results. MEXT must respect the autonomous management of each school. (3) Although MEXT can request the boards of education to participate in the national achievement test program, it should not force them. MEXT explains the purpose of today's national achievement test as follows. (1) To collect the results of the national achievement test to examine the educational practices in each school and the education policy and education administration of each city, and to clarify the goals which schools and boards of education must achieve. (2) To make schools and boards of education recognize their own present status, problems to be resolved and goals to achieve, and establish the PDCA cycle to improve compulsory education. (3) To make schools utilize the test results to improve their practices and student's learning conditions. Some people underline (2) and (3) above, to recognize this PDCA cycle as the "management by objectives" system to improve compulsory education. But they may neglect the rest of them, such as (1) above. MEXT has the strategy to establish the PDCA cycle to control the whole nation's compulsory education system. Although each school and city may have the autonomy to PLAN and DO their educational practices and administration under this cycle, MEXT will CHECK the results of educational practices and administration based on the scores of the national achievement test and take ACTION to make schools and boards improve their practices and administration according to MEXT's policy. Moreover, to control the PLAN and DO, MEXT imposes the national educational goals to be achieved on the schools and boards of education. MEXT explains that the national achievement test is one of the studies which the Local Educational Administration Act permits MEXT to carry out. But this test is administered to play an important role in this newly constructed national control system of compulsory education. If the national achievement test will function as a part of the PDCA cycle which contributes to state control of compulsory education, such a test is not a legal investigation according to the criterion of the Supreme Court decision.