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How well are our Primary School pupils performing?

Jul 01, 2012 AFC Column, Features / Columnists

Now that the Common Entrance results are upon us at this time of the school year, it is important for us to find out more precisely how the pupils have performed at the end of their primary school career.
The examination is officially called “National Grade Six Assessment’, but it includes scores from the Grade Two Assessment and from the Grade Four Assessment in the proportion of 5 per cent and 10 per cent respectively.  Therefore, the papers that the children wrote in the examination at the end of the Easter Term contribute 85 per cent towards the final grading for placement in a secondary school.
Hence, the performance in this final examination plays the major role in determining which school the child enters in September.  However, it was the intention to include the scores at Grade Two and Grade Four so that the earlier performances would count and also provide direction for early remedial action where necessary.
What is of concern now is whether more (percentage wise) pupils are ‘passing’ or ‘failing’ at Grade Six, than at Grades Two and Four. Will the Ministry of Education please tell us?
As soon as the results are out, the TV, Press and Radio go to town with the news of the top candidates and the schools from which they come.  This is rewarding for the children, their teachers and their parents, but these children are the very small minority.
In April last it was reported that 17,000 pupils wrote the examination.  The question to be answered is, “How many pupils got half of the question papers right?”  We do not want to hear the answer in terms of the highest possible scores.  We want to know how many of the 17,000 candidates obtained a score of less than 400.
It was often said that, if you got a score of about 420, you got about half of the work right.  We must know whether a higher percentage of the pupils completing the primary cycle and then proceeding to the secondary schools are really being prepared to grapple with secondary school work now than five or ten years ago. Will the Ministry of Education please tell us?
The performance at the Grade Six examination is a clear indication of the ability of Primary School pupils to read and write.  If half of them do not get half of the work right, it means that about half of them cannot read and write at the required level.  This examination also tests the mastery of Basic Mathematics. How many of the children graduating from the Primary School system have successfully mastered their multiplication tables?
When schools close at the end of this week for the long vacation, there will be remedial classes in some primary schools.  Do these classes help?  In some secondary schools there is a ‘Pre-Form One class’ to give the weaker entrants to secondary schooling a chance to catch up.  Although the numbers in this ‘extra’ class are a reflection of the Primary Schools, it is not too early to find out how successful all of these children are.  Will the Ministry of Education please tell us?
And since education is the means to upward social mobility for everyone, of all ethnic groups, we want to know whether the government Primary School system is succeeding in playing its role in helping to improve the performance of increasing numbers of its graduates.

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