schools in light of the abolition of the controversial 11-Plus exam.

Education Minister the Hon. Gerald Simons and senior education officer for special services Dr. Joseph Christopher are scheduled to meet with PTA executives on Saturday at the Bermuda College's Stonington, Paget campus.

Among the issues that will be discussed in the closed meeting is Government's interim transfer plan.

Students who entered the first year of secondary school in September were the last to sit the 11-Plus exam -- which many complained labelled students at an early age.

Mr. Simons announced earlier this year that a temporary measure of transferring primary students to secondary school would take over until major education reforms, including middle schools, are introduced.

The interim measure will give parents the option of sending their children to high schools near their home or allowing their children to sit entrance exams for one or both of the Island's two top academic high schools -- Berkeley Institute and Warwick Academy.

Students applying to area high schools will receive their first choice or the next nearest school.

Those wanting to attend Warwick Academy, which will become totally private in September, 1995, or Berkeley, will have to sit separate exams designed by the Education Department, the schools' governing Boards, and the Amalgamated Bermuda Union of Teachers and Association of School Principals.

The Royal Gazette understands the format of the admission exams has been set and will be "more difficult than the 11-Plus''.

The exams, which include a mixture of multiple choice and essay questions, "are pitched at the top 25 students'' leaving primary school.