Gov't to put the kibosh on traditional exams?

According to Dagbladet, the Government considers to discontinue traditional final exams in high schools. The arguments are presented that traditional exams are outdated, and that portfolio assessments are better indicators of student performance throughout the year without the stress and chance factors of everything riding on a single performance. Not surprisingly, this initiative comes from the Socialist Left party (SV). In an even less surprising turn of events, the student organizations are besides themselves with joy at the prospect of not having to deal with exams. From the list of blogs that have commented on this story, this proposal also gets high-fives from an antiquated soft-science schnuck.

The Minister of Education is quoted as saying: "Vi ønsker å måle elevenes kunnskaper på en måte som likner den de møter på universitetet og i arbeidslivet" (We wish to measure student knowledge in a way which more closely resembles what they will encounter at universities and in a job situation"). This statement is flat out depressing, since it demonstrates beyond a shadow of a doubt that Solhjell knows nothing about higher education at universities, where the vast majority of courses evaluate student performance through final exams, which act as part of the assessment portfolio. Also, Solhjell states that the portfolios will be evaluated by external examiners so as to guarantee anonymity. We're still talking about high school here, with student numbers vastly eclipsing those at the higher learning institutions like universities and university colleges. I'm mentioning this because universities don't have the necessary funding to use external sensors on everything, so I'm very curious to see how Solhjell proposes to come up with the budget increase this requires.

While I'm not saying that the traditional (mostly written) exam is the best form of student evaluation in existence, I am very sceptical towards this proposal for several reasons:

1. How are they going to measure any improvements unless both paradigms are run in parallel for a large enough statistical sample, in which case I predict the same student organizations won't be as enthusiastic anymore?
2. The people who'd be implementing this reform would be the same geniouses who have implemented every other education reform since the massive failure sometimes known as "Reform 94". Past performance being the best available indicator of future performance, what exactly has changed to suggest that a new reform would be successful? Assuming that the people who brought us reform 94 could come up with a successful education reform if they want to is a little bit like hiring Dr. Kevorkian as the physician at your day care center.
3. There's lots of talk about how Norwegian students are slipping compared to other countries, especially in natural sciences and math. Wouldn't it be a good idea to compare how student evaluation is done in Finland, Germany, etc.? There is mention of "other countries" who use portfolio assessments exclusively, but for some reason their identities don't come up.
4. Being that a grade reflects the performance of a single student, wouldn't it make sense that each student deserves exclusive evaluation? While teamwork is a fine activity, it's not exactly a secret that there are some differences with respect to how much weight each student pulls, which is not reflected in the grade said team effort is rewarded with. Is it fair to reward slackers and punish those who put in more than their share of work? 'Cause traditional exams measure the performances of single students, whereas portfolio assessments carry a collaborative component.
5. With respect to how exams induce stress; what types of jobs don't carry an element of stress related to maximum performance during short burts up against deadlines etc.? Also with respect to how well high school students fare at universities; isn't there enough of a rude awakening already?