This paper investigates the effect of сonstructed-response items in the Unified State Exam (ESE) in History on exam’s validity and the threats to validity. The Unified State Exam is the primary high-stakes examination for Russian students. Despite playing a vital role as an achievement and an admission test, this exam’s validity has not been looked into. The evolution of this exam is distinctly marked by a growing change in the number and weight of constructed-response items, which might be affecting the validity of test results in many ways. The research was focused on interviews with 36 history experts. Thematic analysis of transcripts helped to identify three main threats to validity: faulty criteria, task content and expert bias. The paper presents these results along with recommendations on improving the test.
validity, ESE in history, tests, tasks with a freely constructed answer
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