The Point System

Our school prided itself on how extremely well-structured the courses were. I do agree, because on more than one occasion our teachers either knew less than we did, or knew more but couldn’t say it because they just didn’t know English.

It is my firm conviction that without the point system and a long-standing reputation of excellence propped up by a handful of crucial and talented individuals in every department, the International School of Choueifat would have been another high-class bottomless wastebasket, a posh, back-alley garbage dump of privileged illiterates, a random collection of advantaged pubescence.

The Point System was devised by SABIS, I believe, as a system where specific topics are broken down into piecemeal, easily understandable concepts. They covered only what the administration termed “basic concepts,” and would, by convention, constitute 80% of any non-AMS examination. The remaining 20%, it was contended, would include "thinking questions," potentially (and sometimes practically) unanswerable, but still not a death blow to students. This was, however, a highly elastic principle, because every now and then, class averages did hit the single digits (out of 20).

Each “concept” in the point system was accompanied by a corresponding “sample question.” These concepts would be taught plainly enough in class, but the teachers were not required to go through the sample questions with the students. It was said that the students should deal with sample questions themselves, and at the teacher’s discretion, discuss only the ones they had trouble with. Some teachers, of course, didn't pay attention to the administration's attempts at forging apathy toward the well-being of the students, and went ahead and dedicated periods to tackle the sample questions.

The sample questions, of course, were sold in the school bookstore at the regular, highway robbery prices.

The importance of these sample questions was that they formed the basis of a testing system not dissimilar to Nazi Germany's machines of oppression: The AMS.