Published 24 September 2020
Buckie Got It, St. Kitts and Nevis News Source
Article by
Emmanuel Joseph
A massive online campaign has been launched in Barbados and across the rest of the region demanding a thorough review of the 2020 Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) results.
The campaign, started by a Kim Harper in the form of a petition to the CARICOM Secretariat, is alleging that the Barbados-based CXC has made a mistake with regards to graded results distributed to candidates via the online student portals.
With a target of 7,500 signatures, up 4.45 pm today, 7,528 had signed the petition agreeing that many students’ grades distributed do not accurately reflect their performance in the exams.
The backers of the online campaign are therefore requesting immediate reconsideration and review of all the results.
Yesterday the Council released the results of the Caribbean Certificate of Secondary Level Competence (CCSLC), the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) examinations and Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE).
Hundreds of parents and guardians pulled no punches as they vented their dissatisfaction at the results via the online initiative facilitated by Change.org, a Delaware-based petition website which has over 390 million users and hosts sponsored campaigns for organisations.
“They gave [named mentioned] a 2 in Caribbean Studies which I plan to query because it is making no sense. My child is distressed. This girl deserves her scholarship…and students who were looking for scholarships can’t even get an exhibition. It’s ridiculous,” said an infuriated parent.
“My son’s Spanish subject says ungraded,” lamented another parent.
“We need a change. These results are retarded,” declared yet another parent.
“Some results are not adding up,” a signatory pointed out.
Even teachers signed the petition and made known the complaints of their students.
“My students are claiming that the grades do not reflect their performance. They have been downgraded,” stated one teacher.
“These marks are completely illogical, underserved and poorly accessed. A change needs to be made as this poor effort put in by CXC is ruining the futures of students,” contended another upset signatory.
In response CXC said today there is a long-established process in place for addressing the concerns of candidates regarding their grades.
“Each year, candidates may have questions regarding their results and CXC has a long-established process in place for addressing these concerns,” said the regional examinations body.
The council also informed candidates that the deadline for submission of queries and review requests is Friday 23 October.
“Candidates who have questions about an absent or ungraded result, can submit a query. If there is a question about a grade and the candidate wishes to have a script re-examined, they may submit a request for a review. Further details can be found at http://bit.ly/cxc-queries,” the CXC stated.
It said that queries and reviews may be submitted through schools for in-school candidates or through the Ministry of Education for private candidates.
Yesterday when she delivered a report during a news briefing, CXC’s Director of Operations Examinations Service Division Nicole Manning said there have been slight improvements in the performances of candidates in the CAPE and CSEC exams.
Manning said the performance of candidates in the CSEC Mathematics showed a marked improvement when compared to 2019 and a slight improvement when compared to 2018.
“We saw 52 per cent of our students attaining acceptable grades 1 to 3 in 2020 in CSEC Mathematics when compared to 46 per cent in 2019 and 49 per cent in 2018,” she revealed.
She also disclosed that in the CSEC English A the performance this year showed a slight improvement as well when compared to 2019 and a marked improvement compared to 2018.
Manning reported that 82 per cent of students attained grades 1 to 3 this year in English A, compared to 79 per cent in 2019 and 71 per cent in 2018. [email protected]
