P.S.E. results show major drop in science

The Ministry of Education today released the results of the Primary School Examination. And while some of the numbers are upbeat, they are not painting the kind of picture of primary school performance that educators were hoping for. According to a preliminary assessment done by the Examinations Unit, the national average this year in mathematics was forty-one point nine percent, a minuscule increase over last year’s average and down a full five percent from the 2001 scores. In English the national average this year was fifty-four point nine, a four percent increase over last year’s. In science, however, the national average plummeted almost seven percent: fifty-two percent this year compared to fifty-eight point nine in 2002. Head of the Examinations Unit, Yvonne Davis, says that much more work remains to be done.

Yvonne Davis, Head of Examination Unit

“We have seen a lot of improvements, particularly in the English Language paper. It’s telling us that the teachers are working, they are working real hard, they are getting the children to write and read well.”

Patrick Jones

“Four years after the introduction of P.S.E, is it achieving the goals?”

Yvonne Davis

“I believe it is, because, what the P.S.E. aims to do is really to give us a true picture of how the children are performing and it has been doing that since 2000. I believe the teachers are working hard at improving performance, because when they had seen it in the first instance it wasn’t a good picture. It’s still not satisfactory, but we are heading towards some improvement…I was very disappointed with the science results because we have seen a decrease in the science performance, but the math again as well is a challenging area, is still a challenging area for the children, particularly the problem solving area.”

Davis says that although there are nagging problems in the three subjects being tested under the P.S.E., those who sit the exam next year will have to do a social studies paper in addition to mathematics, English Language and science. A total of five thousand eight hundred and fourteen primary school students and eighty-five private candidates sat this year’s P.S.E. on May fifth.