THE Secondary Entrance Assessment (SEA) exam will be held on July 1.

In confirming this at a virtual press conference on Tuesday, Education Minister Dr Nyan Gadsby-Dolly would have brought an end to months of uncertainty among Standard 5 students and their parents as to whether or not the exam would be held given the pandemic and the Government calling a state of emergency.

Gadsby-Dolly also presented her ministry's operational preparedness plan for the much-anticipated examination.

She said 19,656 students are registered to write this year's exam of which, 18,592 will write it in Trinidad and 1,064 in Tobago. She said 9,905 of the students are males and 9,751 are females.

Director of the ministry's school supervision and management division, Naima Hosein, said the ministry sourced a supervisory staff of 3,919 to oversee the exam. 'Supervisory staff stationed at schools comprise mainly teachers and administrators,' she said.

She added that of the 4,000 covid19 vaccines assigned to the ministry, 3,635 teachers and school administrators - principals and vice-principals - have been vaccinated to date.

'This Saturday, an additional 500 teachers or administrators who are willing to volunteer to supervise the SEA, will be vaccinated.'

Gadsby-Dolly said roughly 1,100 administrators who identified themselves to be working for SEA at the time of the vaccination rollout, have already been vaccinated.

Hosein said that usually, testers are assigned to supervise at schools they do not work in, but this year, teachers will be given the option of testing in their own school or another.

'Due to the pandemic, many teachers felt more comfortable to supervise at their own respective schools," she explained.

There are 184 monitors this year from the ministry's various divisions including curriculum, planning, educational research and evaluation, and human resource. Hosein said monitors have already visited exam centres across the country to ensure compliance with protocols, ahead of the exam.

This year, 445 concessions have been approved for students identified as having a need that puts them at a disadvantage for writing the exam, including braille and large print for the visually-impaired and a sign language interpreter, for the hearing-impaired.

The ministry also detailed protocols in place for parents, testers, and students on the compound at examination centres.

Education House Officer Dr Amanda Solomon said each of the eight educational districts - seven in Trinidad and one in Tobago - is assigned one medical doctor and two nurses. She said nurses have also done in-person visits to schools to ensure health protocols are being met.

'For both SEA and Caribbean Examination Council (CXC) exams, screening questions will be asked at the door.' She said the ministry is asking parents to prepare children to answer these questions to assess any the personal risk.

Students are asked to walk with their own sanitisers, and m