2012 CSEC results should reflect value for money – Education Minister
Having pumped just about $24 million, apart from teachers’ salaries, into the education sector on an annual basis, the government, through the Priya Manickchand-headed Ministry of Education, is determined to reap value for money at this year’s Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) Examination. A review of current capital type investment has suggested that “we are not seeing the corresponding rise in grades in the two particular subject areas of Maths and English,” according to the Minister. . “This is one of the biggest Ministries in terms of the resources that are plugged into the Ministry but the result has not been proportionate to the investments made…the problem with that is very simple, if our children can’t matriculate with Maths and English then it means they are going to be a lot of doors that are closed to them; in the job area and the further education area and we need to make sure that that changes.”
It was against this background that she saw it necessary to introduce an ambitious programme during the latter part of last year, aiming for drastic improvements come results time.
Manickchand has pointed out that while in the area of English there have been indications of acceptable results, the subject area of Maths, over the past 10 years, reflects a mere 10 per cent increase in the pass rate from about 20 per cent to currently 30 per cent.
“This is where we are at right now and this remains unacceptable in any language. The fact remains that we are seeing some countries having 31 and 38 per cent, but all under 40 per cent, and this is no comfort to me because at the end of the day, what it means is that we have 70 per cent of our children not having some of the doors we have here opened to them.” The Minister as a result questioned “what is the point of developing Guyana or making our country move from a low income, heavily in-debt, poor country, to a middle income developing country if the new opportunities arising in this country are going to be out of the reach of our next generation?”
According to the Minister, the rationale behind striving to improve the rate of performance in the subject areas is geared at ensuring that “our children can go on to universities, whether local or foreign, and be able to access certain jobs. If they don’t have Maths and English, then in a sense we are failing them and certainly we are failing our dear country…” The Minister alluded to the National Pledge, pointing to the fact that the whole theme of the pledge is that we will do what is good for Guyana. “That is not to say that we think teachers have not been doing what is good, but somehow or the other the system has not been able to get those grades up and this for me is not only a matter of concern but almost a challenge or a red flag in front of a bull…We have the potential to make changes and we can combine the potential we have to see actual results for Maths and English if we could improve the grades of at least 1,500 of our children.”
In fact, the Minister is optimistic that the subject area could reflect, at the minimum, a 20 percent improvement when the CSEC results are unveiled later this year.
Her assurance has been reflected by an $85.7M Government approved contract for the procurement of items to boost students’ learning.
These included CXC General Maths Book I and II, the Self-Study Guide for CXC, the collection of revision DVDs, the combined pass papers from 2008 to 2011, Model Solutions to difficult answers, Combined Solution for everything in addition to a Geometry set, graph paper and a scientific calculator, which have been distributed to the participating schools.
Each student slated to be a part of a pilot project introduced by the Ministry of Education has been provided with the procured materials and teachers have been provided with individual syllabuses and a collection of the package to allow them to effectively work with each student.
