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A Lesson From School

By David Goodrich

Think back to high school math. Remember when the teacher handed out a test? Inside you would beg “No word problems – please, no word problems.” If the test was just multiple choice questions, or better yet true and false questions, you would breathe a sigh of relief. Why was this? Multiple-choice questions present you with the answer, and if you couldn’t come up with an answer you could usually figure out enough to eliminate two answers and give yourself a 50% chance to guess the answer. With word problems though, you not only had to know your theorems and equations well enough to answer a question, you had to recognize which to use or which was applicable in a given situation.

Then there were proofs – remember those? With a proof you not only had to know how to use an equation but you had to demonstrate why the equation was valid for a particular problem. With either word problems or proofs, you were required to apply your knowledge to real world situations, when you succeeded in arriving at a correct answer; you knew you had accomplished something.

IdopI Programmer Evaluation Services (IPES) evaluations are like a mixture of word problems and proofs. IPES evaluations require an evaluee to demonstrate his or her skill and knowledge by requiring the evaluee to complete an actual programming assignment and then defend his or her solutions by answering short answer and essay questions.

IPES evaluations:

are actual programming assignments
require an evaluee to demonstrate why he or she chose a specific solution
are specific to a technology area and programming language.

Competitor’s evaluations:

ask an evaluee to choose answers to multiple-choice questions that are general in nature
rely on minutia
do not require the evaluee be able to demonstrate an ability to apply knowledge.

When an evaluee scores well on an IPES evaluation, that evaluee has proven that he or she is able to apply skill and knowledge against real-world software development problems.

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