20 000 fail grade 10

Education minister Katrina Hanse-Himarwa says it is back to the drawing board after a dismal grade 10 performance by the class of 2018. This year's pass rate dropped to 53.3%, compared to last year's 55.3%.Hanse-Himarwa yesterday announced that out of the 44 863 candidates who sat for the Junior Secondary Certificate examination this year, only 23 911 qualified for grade 11, meaning close to 21 000 failed to make the grade. “Although we worked tirelessly, especially the grade 10 results were not what I expected as a minister. I was expecting much better performance seeing that grade 10 is phasing out. We will interrogate what really went wrong,” she said. “If the quality of the answer of a learner is not to the expected standard, it speaks to the quality that is transferred in the classroom. It speaks to whether the children are properly prepared in the classroom, and to the preparedness, the readiness and ability and competencies of the educators,” she said. She added that self-study also remained a serious challenge and said it was unacceptable that learners could not use resources such as the internet to prepare for exams. “If others can perform the way they do, surely we can also. I believe no Namibian child is put in a space where they cannot perform. No poverty, no homelessness, no hunger can really be a reason for us not to perform to the best of our ability. “Those conditions must be motivating factors and used as stepping stones to improve your own life to emerge beyond your circumstances,” she said. The ministry had kept the maximum points at 23 and an F grade as a minimum symbol in English for admission to grade 11. Compared to 2017, the results show an average drop of 0.4% for grades A to E whereas increases of 0.1% and 1.0% were recorded at grades F and G, respectively. “The ungraded entries increased by 0.8% while 96.1% candidates were graded throughout the nine subjects.” According to yesterday's results the Erongo and Khomas regions performed the best in English second language, with a 51.4% pass rate. Erongo has a 37.5% pass rate in physical science and 47.7% in mathematics. Oshikoto is the top performer in mathematics at 54.3%, dropping from 60.8% in 2017. The best performers in physical science were Oshikoto and Kavango West with 49.3%. Omusati took the top spot for life science with 50.1% while Oshikoto once again led with geography at 48.9% and history with 49.2%. Oshikoto education director Lameck Kafidi said a lack of funding played a critical role in the delivering of quality equation. “People must know the real circumstances that are affecting the grade 10 results. In the past we had the school development fund but now the money from government was transferred to the schools late. “It should not come as a surprise that the global economic downturn has affected the education sector as well,” he said. The newly appointed education director for Erongo, Erenfriede Stephanus, said the foundation must be fixed. According to her learners are often neglected in the primary grades and promoted until they reach grade 10 where they cannot make the grade. “I believe once we have good readers and learners in the lower grades who understand mathematics well, then we won't have this kind of result. Transferring of learners is a problem and it creates a breakdown. As a result you end up with learners in grade 10 who could not pass the lower grades,” she said. She, too, believes self-study must be encouraged, adding that it does not make sense that regions like Erongo produce a good grade in English but they drop out in other subjects. JEMIMA BEUKES

20 000 fail grade 10

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Namibian Sun 2024-11-25

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20 000 fail grade 10

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Namibian Sun 2024-11-25

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