Students Sit PSE Part I
Students from across the country sat Part One of the Primary School Examination which sets the stage for them to advance to secondary school. It is not a requirement, except for a few schools, but still high achievers qualify for scholarships which is clearly is an incentive. Over seven thousand students took the exams including ninety-one students living with disabilities. News Five Isani Cayetano caught up with the students to see if they were prepared for the annual exams.
Isani Cayetano, Reporting
Standard six students across the country sat part one of the Primary School Examinations earlier today. A little over seven thousand boys and girls are being evaluated for proficiency in English and Science. The annual testing precedes their entry to secondary school. Leticia Gomez bussed in her students from La Democracia to sit the exams at E.P. Yorke High School.
Leticia Gomez
Leticia Gomez, Std. 6 Teacher, St. Agnes Anglican School
“I had sixteen students, five girls and eleven boys taking the exam for today.”
Isani Cayetano
“Now I’m thinking, in terms of sixteen students you have different strengths and weaknesses and what have you, what’s your confidence in their overall performance?”
Leticia Gomez
“Well I believe with the grace of God they will do better than what they do when they did the mock exam. So I believe they will do [good] because sometimes it’s just the fret of the exam and having, getting them to prepare and when they come and they actually sit and take the exam, they give a different feeling towards it.”
Hosin Shoman
Preparations, according to several participants, involved extra hours of tutoring and studying.
Hosin Shoman, Student, Hummingbird Elementary
“My studies, well it was intense and it took a while, so I hope, hopefully I got a really good grade on it.”
Isani Cayetano
“In terms of the questions that were asked in either the English or the Science exams, did you find any of them to be difficult or questions that were not necessarily what you prepared for?”
Hosin Shoman
“No, I prepared for everything so I’m pretty confident about the grade I’m going to get, hopefully, over ninety.”
This year, the number of males sitting the P.S.E. is a little more than their female counterparts. That figure fluctuates on a yearly basis.
Nelson Longsworth, Director of Exams, Ministry of Education
“Today was the first sitting of this year’s PSE, the Primary School Examinations, where the children sat A in Language Arts which is called the English Paper and the Science Papers. A total of seven thousand, two hundred and forty-three candidates were registered to take the exam today. The exact numbers who sat it we’ll probably know sometime later tonight.”
Nelson Longsworth
Isani Cayetano
“Is this a step up from the number who have sat previous exams?”
Nelson Longsworth
“I see a very small increase, if it’s between twenty-five and fifty at most. Somehow it’s leveling off. We use to have some big jumps from year to year but it’s at most a small increase.”
Isani Cayetano
“Are there any trends this time around in terms of maybe the number of female students as opposed to the number of male students who are sitting the exams?”
Nelson Longsworth
“It fluctuates every year, this year there seem to be more males than females. In fact, the actual breakdown is three thousand, six hundred and fifty-seven females, and a small, well not big difference, but three thousand six hundred and eighty-six males. And then one year, next year it might be a little more females than males but it’s relatively balanced overall.”
Moises Florian, who attends Central Christian School, is confident in his overall performance today since he has been preparing tirelessly for the first leg of the assessment.
Moises Florian
Moises Florian, Std. 6 Student, Central Christian School
“Like the conjunctions and those stuff, I wasn’t prepared because I didn’t study a lot of that. I studied my letters. I am sure that I will pass my letters in high scores.”
Isani Cayetano
“What about the Science exam, were you prepared properly for that?”
Moises Florian
“Yeah, I was very prepared for that. I studied a lot in Science because I love it.”
Isani Cayetano
“In terms of your overall performance in this part of the PSE, do you think you will do well?”
Moises Florian
“Yeah, I will do great because my brother did great too. Eighty-five point five and he’s going to E.P. Yorke.”
Isani Cayetano
“Now were you able to get extra classes, maybe like Saturday classes or you stayed back after school to prepare yourself?”
Moises Florian
“Yeah, we had morning class, afternoon class and evening class and Saturday class too.”
Reporting for News Five, I am Isani Cayetano.
Part Two will be held in the months to come and the results will be known thereafter.
