Traditionally in Brazil, universities have each had their own entrance exam. A student applying to six universities, would need to travel to each university and sit for six different exams. The process was inefficient and costly for both students and universities.

In order to make the admissions process more egalitarian and streamlined, Brazil created the ENEM, a national entrance exam. This year is the second year the exam has been in official use and is now used by many universities as the sole entrance criteria or a first round exam.

How’s it working out?

Putting aside my personal belief that a single test score on a single weekend is a terrible way of determining a student’s merit, the ENEM in Brazil has been a tutorial on how to screw up administering a national exam. A true comedy of errors, that is unfortunately not funny at all since kids, already in one of the most stressful times of their lives, are the ones who suffer.

Let’s start at the beginning.

In 2009, the answers were leaked in advance and the exam was scrapped days before the testing date. Every student in Brazil hoping to attend college had to regroup, the exam rewritten and universities across the country had to push back start dates in order to use the ENEM as their admissions criteria.

Earlier this year a software error within the Ministry of Education released personal data for millions of students.

Last weekend the 2010 ENEM was given. This time around the test was successfully kept secret. Not quite as successful was the printing. At least 2000 tests had the Natural Science and Human Science questions inverted from the results sheet, some tests were missing or repeated questions and there are reports the essay theme was leaked in advance.

Inevitably, someone sued. That “someone” being both state and federal agencies arguing the test failed the very basic standard of being equal for all students. A federal judge ruled the exam invalid. Inep, the federal agency responsible for the ENEM, appealed the judge’s decision and as of Friday the ENEM results are reinstated. But the appeals court’s decision is, of course, being appealed. The minister of Education said it would take at least two or three months to organize a second exam for all 3.4 million students and is therefore in favor of keeping last week’s test. A final decision could be weeks away.

In the meantime, a second exam has been schedule for the students who received misprinted tests on the same days as the individual entrance exams for many of the top universities. Those students will have to choose which exam to take either forgoing application to a top university or the many universities who use the ENEM.

And the students, the children who spent hours preparing and planning futures based on the results of this exam, they are being told not to worry and go on prepping for any other entrance exams they have.

I think it’s important to see this entire fiasco from the student’s perspective. In the US, the SAT and the anxiety it causes are well known. Imagine if the SAT was the only admissions criteria. No grades, no essays, no letters of rec. Just an SAT score. That is the situation in Brazil. I’ve worked with teens here during the process and American seniors a zen masters compared to their test obsessed Brazilian counterparts.

Based on my work here, I have some advice for Inep.

Unfortunately, there is no way to salvage this year’s exam. Either 3 million students have to take the ENEM again in a few months or 2,000 take it again and miss out on applying to the universities with overlapping exams.

There is a solution for next year, however. Don’t offer the exam.

The Minister of Education should take responsibility and admit the federal government is not yet capable of administering an exam to 3 million students simultaneously. Therefore, the ENEM should be suspended for a minimum of 5 years.

Universities will return to offering their own entrance exams. Don’t worry. The ENEM has only been official for two years. I’m sure universities are still capable of administering their own exams at least as successfully as you have administered yours.

Over the next five years you, the bureaucrats, will revamp security and printing protocol. You will follow the excellent advice of Maria Helena de Castro, a former president of Inep, expand the question bank from a meagre 10,000 to 100,000 so that you can always have multiple of versions of the exam. This way you will be able to offer the exam on multiple weekends allowing backup dates should there be problems and reducing the number of students sitting for any exam.

The exam will be administered during the next five years on a trial basis. Scholarships for top scorers and emphasizing the chance to practice sitting for entrance exams, are ways to encourage students to take the exam seriously during it’s trial phase.

If after five years Inep has managed to administer the exam without security breaches or the score sheet being printed in reverse order, then the test may be brought back for official use.

A spokewoman for Inep called the 2009 exam a great success. That is wrong. It was successfully salvaged after a disaster. Now, officials are saying this year’s exam was successful save the misprinted exams, dismissing the 2,000 students who received those exams. Inep claims to have made the admissions process better for students, but based on the many student protests against the ENEM this week, I don’t think they believe you.