The lockdown of the Caribbean Examinations Council’s headquarters in St Michael, Barbados, due to the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in the delay in announcing the top performers at its CAPE and CSEC examinations.
This was disclosed by Minister of Education, Priya Manickchand, during a virtual press conference on Wednesday. She said that the delay of the official release of the names of the top performing students is due to CXC being restricted from continuing its review process because Barbados is in a lockdown caused by the pandemic.
Manickchand said any announcement by the Ministry at this time of the top performing students would be premature. She added that it would be clumsy to do so when there is a possibility that those students’ grades which are yet to be reviewed can change the overall outcome.
The Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) and Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE) exams were written in July/August 2020 but upon the preliminary results being released in September, there was a region-wide outcry about a number of discrepancies. The education ministry in Guyana immediately informed the Council of its displeasure with the grades issued which lowered the country’s Grade Point Average. The examination body agreed to review the grades, hence the country is now awaiting the results of the completed review.
According to Manickchand, a total of 12,009 students from Guyana registered to write the CSEC exams with a total of 70,710 entries in various subject areas. CXC has since revealed that the review process now stands at 90 per cent completed. The report sent to the ministry by CXC on the preliminary results, states that 1,258 subject reviews were submitted to CXC for CSEC by 500 candidates of which 128 are still being processed. Grade One changes were awarded to 456 grade reviews while 674 grades remained the same. A check of the pending reviews showed a number of candidates could receive review changes that may likely affect the list of candidates with the highest number of Grade Ones, the report states. In addition, the minister informed that 33 reviewed results are currently outstanding for CAPE.
The education minister also pointed out that many students would need the certificates from CXC to move on to tertiary education both at the local and international level.
In this regard, CXC is tasked with explaining the situation to the relevant universities. She noted that students have begun to receive some certificates from CXC especially at the CAPE level, which can be used internationally to assess tertiary education. However, the minister expressed the hope that the process would soon be completed as it would bring closure for the students.
