Education’s Groundhog Day

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Government has been claiming in Town Hall meetings that GCSE pass rates this year are 90 percent or higher — using G as a pass.

Despite repeated requests from this newspaper, the Ministry of Eduction is refusing to release the detailed results until the end of the month, almost two months after last year and almost four months after the students got their results.

Why? The Ministry says it wants to share the results with parents at Town Hall meetings yet those who attended were just shown two graphs showing the vast majority of GCSE results were technical passes — but most results appear to be under the grade of C.

Of course, this can clearly be interpreted that there is something to hide, that reforms within the education system are not taking hold quickly enough or that the reforms themselves are lacking in substance.

This Government has often stated that it is committed to transparency — if that is so, release the results in full and quickly. Like it or not, results are the benchmark of success — and the public needs and deserves to know at what level that benchmark is being met.

The Cambridge GCSE system offers grades from A* to G. Grades A through C are considered level two passes, while grades D through G are considered level one passes. Grades below G are given a U grade for unclassified.

This is what this newspaper wrote about the same issue last year: “Quite simply, you cannot have two passing grades for one exam. Telling people they have passed the exam when no one in the world recognises the grade as a pass is disingenuous and only sets them up for failure.”

It is tempting just to run last year’s editorial on this issue in full, so little, it seems, has changed and no lessons seem to have been learned — it is almost as if the Ministry of Eduction is stuck in its own Groundhog Day.

It is nonsense that the Ministry is still trying to persuade parents, pupils and — perhaps more importantly — employers that G is a pass. While it may do the student’s self-esteem some good to think they have passed, it will not do any good to their long-term prospects in the job market. Additionally, if a G is regarded as a pass where is the incentive for students and teachers to raise standards?

Director of Academic Services Llewellyn Simmons was recently quoted in this paper as saying: “We are going to put a lot of attention on maths and science. We want to raise the bar in all areas, but particularity math and science.”

The bar does indeed need raising and soon, or too many young Bermudians will suffer as a result.

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