Walter B Alexander
Ever since the “Common Entrance” Examination replaced the former County Scholarship Examination in the 1960s there has always been much publicity about the ‘top’ performers. This trend has continued through the years even when the examination became known as the Secondary Schools Entrance Examination (SSEE). By law all Primary Schools pupils who are over 10 years and under 12 years of age by March 31 in the year of the examination are eligible to enter for the examination (with or without their Birth Certificates). In 2013 by which time the examination became known as the National Grade Six Assessment (NGSA) the entries were in excess of 16,000. Also in this year the Ministry of Education succeeded in providing the results relatively early, at the end of the first week in June. Almost immediately we were fed with the glorious performance of the ‘top’ 1 % (about 170 candidates), but we are yet to hear how many candidates got at least half of the work correct. We would like to know more precisely how our Primary Schools as a whole are performing, as we head towards