By Tracey Khan – Drakes
[www.inewsguyana.com] – CSEC and CAPE exams have been moved to June 15 and 16 to facilitate the holding of general and regional elections on May 11, according to Education Minister Priya Manickchand.
At a news conference on Monday, January 26, Minister Manickchand explained that a number of issues were taken into consideration before the new date was decided in order to ensure that students are not at a disadvantage.
Following President Donald Ramotar’s announcement that May 11 would be Election Day, discussions were held by the Ministry with the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) and other stakeholders for changes to be made in this regard, since schools are used as polling stations on elections day.
“Several possible options that could be exercised was discussed and considered; at all times during the discussions and deliberations the Ministry’s paramount consideration was the interest of the candidates.”
She noted that the Ministry is always keen to ensure that examinations are conducted in a smooth and effective manner. Manickchand also made it clear that even though Guyanese students would be sitting the exam at a later date, their results will be available on time with the rest of the region.
“CXC will mark all scripts and issue results at the same time the CXC/CAPE results were originally scheduled to be delivered. CXC will officially inform the candidates about this change in timetable. The Ministry of Education shall also take all necessary steps to ensure each and every candidate is informed of the timetable change.”
When asked if security concerns were taken into consideration by the Ministry, Manickchand noted that, “we were not overly concern because of security reasons because like I said we expect mature behavior that will not see us having security concerns, our major concern was how to use the place of polls at which our exam centers so deemed by CXC to conduct an exam under that condition.”
CEC’s Registrar, Glenroy Cummerbatch explained that the shifting of this date will mean that additional costs would be incurred by the Guyana government.
He noted that students in Guyana will have “paralleled papers, they will not be the exact same wording and questions and so on but the will be parallel in terms of capability, parallel in terms of context and demand…we always have what we call backup papers so if something goes amiss there would be additional papers waiting that we can use.”
The CXC subjects slated for June 15 include Agricultural Science (Double award) Paper two, Home Economics: Management Paper 2, Technical drawing and Theatre Arts paper one along with Electrical & Electronic Technology paper 1, Food &Nutrition Paper 2 and Electrical & Electronic Technology Paper 2.
CAPE subjects include geometrical & Mechanical Engineering Drawing Unit 1, paper 2, History Unit 1, paper 2, Art & Design Unit 1 & 2, paper 2 & 3, French Unit 2, paper 2 and Environmental Science unit 2, paper 2 and will be written on June 16 along with Communications studies paper 2, Pure mathematics Unit 1, paper 2 and Agricultural Science Unit 2, paper 2.
Opposition Leader, David Granger had called for a new election date to be announced in order to provide a smooth flow of the exams, while the safety of the students were also questioned.
What would you prefer, being disturbed on example day or exam on another day. I never did a survey and if you did provide the results.
You clearly did not go to school too long. Taking an exam at a later in never beneficial to the student. You should survey the students and ask them if they wanted the exams to be postponed. I bet the findings would tell you no.
This is very good, and yes it will give the kids some time to prepare ,,THANK YOU Minister and team,,keep the great work up Priya,,
That will tremendously benefit the students. It will give them extra time to prepare for the specific exams.