THE STATE is asking students who scored less than 50 per cent in this year's Secondary Entrance Assessment (SEA) exam to take remedial classes, yet as of last Friday the State itself was struggling to cross that pass mark in terms of getting all or most of the 9,000 students to subscribe to its Vacation Revision Programme.
Whether walk-in pupils or last-minute registrations will substantially change the figures or not, the fact that only 30 per cent of the intended pool registered in the days before the start of classes shows a lack of enthusiasm for this programme.
It also tells us in no uncertain terms of the failure of the education system to inspire hope, enthusiasm, or confidence. It confirms what many already see: there is a dysfunction at the core of the education system, a dysfunction that cannot be papered over by remedial classes alone.
The State should have seen this year's results coming. The issue of student underperformance has been on the horizon for a while now.
In 2020, the proportion of students passing the SEA examination was roughly 63 per cent. In 2021, that figure fell to 52 per cent. It is possible this trend took shape or was hinted at decades earlier, in statistics and projections seen only by officials at the Ministry of Education.
At whatever point the drop in standards became clear, the ministry should have been alert to the need for measures which could have been implemented prior to this year's examination.
Teachers, too, should have been able to pick up on cues from classroom observation, as well as mock examinations. Those that had concerns should have been listened to.
There's no reason why students had to be subject to the humiliation of sitting an exam for which it was possible to foresee they might not have been ready. These students have not failed, they have been failed.
Clearly, the Government intends the Vacation Revision Programme to act as a 'bridge' between primary school and secondary school for those who need extra help.
But while we do not doubt the skills and competencies of the teachers recruited to run this programme, it is hard to understand what the ministry hopes to achieve in four weeks, after years of problems.
Nor has any system of evaluation of the programme been spelt out so that the fulfilment of objectives can be measured.
Instead, there is a plethora of unquantifiable factors that contribute to unequal performance which cannot be erased overnight: economic and social disparities, the increasing mismatch between the urgent realities of our world and the curriculum, and the lack of commitment to continuous assessment.
It's not just children, but rather the education system, and the SEA format, in particular, that needs remedying.
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