Vraag: Wat is de juiste term voor voldoende/onvoldoende cijfer als het gaat om toetsen en examens? Is het bijvoorbeeld insufficient mark of fail mark?

Antwoord: voldoende = pass/pass mark onvoldoende = fail/fail mark

Toelichting:
Op de community site Engels stelde een native speaker in Nederland dit punt als volgt aan de orde:

Dear Colleagues,

Who among you use the term insufficient mark? I seem to hear this term in so many schools and used by so many teachers. But what is strange, is that I had never heard of this term before coming to Holland! (I was born and grew up in England.)

It is perhaps my pet hate and I thought I would share it with you. “Insufficient” does not exist as a mark in the UK education system. Maybe it does somewhere else in the world. The Brits just use the term “fail” (and people tell me the Dutch are direct......)

I hope you don’t mind me sharing this, but I had to get it off my chest.

Toen op de communitysite een samenvatting van reacties op deze oproep uitbleef, heb ik de betreffende native speaker gevraagd of hij reacties had ontvangen. Zijn antwoord:

I stirred up quite a hornets' nest and decided not to post any more remarks about "insufficient marks" A lot of people seemed rather offended and were keen to defend the use of "insufficient". However some of the younger teachers and all the other native English speakers (regardless of origin) did agree that "insufficient" is incorrect.

Veel docenten bliijken er dus van overtuigd te zijn dat ‘insufficient mark’ (en dus ook ‘sufficient’) correct is. Jammer dat de docent die dit punt aan de orde stelde zo was afgeschrikt door de reacties, dat hij afzag van rapportage op de communitysite.
Dat fail/fail mark en pass/pass mark de juiste termen zijn wordt ondersteund door teksten op sites van Britse onderwijsinstellingen en kranten. Enkele citaten:

1 Cambridge Advanced English exams
This exam is made up of five tests which have a total of 200 marks. You will need more than 120 (60%) to pass the exam. The lowest pass mark is a C, and fail marks are D and E. The tests are Reading, Writing, English in Use, Listening and Speaking. You do not need to get a pass mark in all of these papers to pass the exam. (www.english-online.org.uk)

2 The Guardian
Technically speaking, a 'G' grade constitutes a 'pass' at GCSE, but the real pass mark is a 'C'. It is attainment of this level and any grades above it ... (www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/apr/20/educationnews.education)

3 Queen’s University Belfast
Those candidates who, having reached a pass mark in the taught modules, submit an unsatisfactory dissertation, will be awarded a Diploma. (www.qub.ac.uk/schools/SchoolofModernLanguages/SubjectAreas)

4 King’s College London
If you do so, you will normally receive a fail mark for the May/June assignment/examination … (www.kcl.ac.uk/schools/humanities/depts/classics)

5 Over de voorbereiding op de Cambridge Exams
Just 20 minutes a day brushing up on your English can make all the difference between a pass or a fail mark. (www.flo-joe.co.uk/whatwedo.)

En zo kan ik er nog wel tientallen noemen.

In de idioomboeken Start Up, Step Up, Build Up, Follow Up en Finish Up wordt steeds pass/pass mark en fail/fail mark gebruikt.

Tenslotte:
Voldoende en ononvoldoende als bijvoeglijk naamwoord = satisfactory/unsatisfactory
Bijvoorbeeld: een (on)voldoende opstel = a satisfactory/an unsatisfactory essay.

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