– ministry commits to finding out why, addressing it

SOME 600 Guyanese who wrote the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) exams were unable to score a pass, something that the ministry of education intends addressing in the future, said Chief Education Officer (CEO) Marcel Hutson.
An analysis of the 2018 results has revealed that for the general and technical proficiencies, the overall pass rate was 69.1 per cent.

The pass rate reflected an increase of about six per cent when compared to that of 2017 which was 63.68 per cent.

Although the increase was welcomed by the ministry, Hutson said they intend addressing the number of zero passes.

“We did not make the comparison last year, but we have to look at it now; it is something we will be addressing going forward, because it is important to us,” he said, adding that they intend disaggregating the 600 students and isolating the schools in order to recognise where the issue is.

Observing the zero passes is something the ministry has done for the first time, but they have committed to continuing to monitor it in order to ensure that the number decreases.
The sitting of the 2018 CSEC and the Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examinations began on May 7. The Guyana Chronicle had reported that according to information received from the Superintendent of Examinations within the Ministry of Education, Ms. Sauda Kadir, 12,266 candidates registered to sit the examinations this year as compared to 12,684 candidates in 2017.

She had also said that 923 candidates would be writing the CAPE examinations this year, as opposed to the 851 who wrote it in 2017.

The Caribbean Examination Council (CXC) had reported that 11,000 pupils across the Region who wrote CSEC last May/June did not get passes.