Masum Billah
We have witnessed the results of tiny tots for the fifth time since it was introduced in 2010. It was introduced with a very good intention undoubtedly but the repeated question leakage issue and turning the whole teaching learning situation into examination focussed instead of disseminating knowledge really and failure to enrich the learners with real competencies have thrown the whole process into a questionable strait. Finland is considered the real model of education in today’s world where students need not take any formal test till they cross thirteen years of their schooling. Obviously they learn through fun and games and doing activities suitable to their age and psychology. And this is a common practice to have public examination after the completion of twelfth grade even in many developing countries. We have started putting the very tiny tots into a serous assessment situation which has thrown them into a world of tension and they have lost their usual smiling, pleasure, ways of growing up. When they are supposed to go to the open playground, they are going to the teachers’ house, or attending extra classes at school or in a so-called coaching centre in a congested room. We have never thought of their mental hunger, mental, physical and psychological growth and its proper flourishment. A child is going to the coaching centre or a teacher’s house with a heavy bag of books of various types, scripts and a hill of tension in his/her head. To make it worse, guardians are chasing and chiding them for getting less marks than their other classmates. This is the reality which we cannot deny. We have forgotten what real education is, what real learning is and how it should be ensured.We just emphasise on and our whole educational concern is focussed on pass percentage and obtaining good grades which is known to all and need no further explanation. And we are doing it through summative assessment which cannot ensure the assessment of real learning and acquired competency of the learners. In two or three hours students are to produce everything what they have learnt for the last five years cannot be taken as a standard of measuring someone’s quality. What we see in our practical life, the students who could not earn good grades in the formal educational institutions have become very successful leaders and professionals in their practical life. Why? Either the teachers could not identify the sleeping talents of those students or they could not find suitable environment to make their talents bloom. Though it was the real duty of the teachers to discover the latent potential of each and every student, they did not do it. Why? We don’t use the tool of formative assessment to measure the qualities of the learners. It is absolutely necessary particularly to measure the growing qualities of the young learners. We should have formative assessment and the teachers of primary and secondary level must have serious training in it. There should be summative assessment also but with less emphasis. When, things can be ensured like this, we will not have serious debate and criticism regarding the quality of education. Students work a lot at the cost of their mental and psychological pleasure and guardians are to spend a significant amount of their time and money and the children get a certificate. But their competency does not develop at the desired level. It has been a talked about topic in the country in general and the educational arena in particular for years together. All this is happening mostly because of the absence of formative assessment and the over emphasis of summative assessment. Summative assessment could have been taken as a good model, if the odd factors and corruptions taking place in the whole examination management system had not prevailed.
It is very interesting in our educational management that nobody asks whether a student who has passed the PSC or JSC examination can read Bengali, English, or can sing a song, can speak in correct and good Bengali, English, can draw pictures, sing our national anthem, do some easy calculations in their practical life. As part of my official duty which coincides with my personal interest to visit different schools, I talk to the students and teachers and see their practical knowledge. I visit many rural schools frequently. Just before the JSC examination I visited several schools both in urban and rural areas. I asked many JSC candidates to tell them in English that they are going to sit for JSC examination in November 2014. Only one student from an urban school could answer though not fully correctly. There were about one hundred students in the class. In some schools in Kustia and Faridpur not a single student could answer. I asked them to tell me two or three sentences about ‘English For Today’ (their English textbook). None could tell me anything. I gave them some simple mathematical problems, none could do them. I asked some students to read their Bengali book, none could read satisfactorily. I am not exaggerating. This is the reality. Why they could not do that, because these things don’t come in the examination. They take preparation just to pass and get good grades in the examination. What a strange situation! No student can ask any question in English. Why they need not make any question. They just give the answer or put a tick mark knowingly or unknowingly. What about guardians? They never ask their children whether they get up from sleep early in the morning, they don’t ask whether they have played in the field today or walked for sometime in the open space or on the house roof, or watched any good movie on the TV or talked to a friend or neighbor. Their common queries are—where they have done the homework of the school, homework of house tutor, or coaching centre, when is the next coaching, when he/she is going to attend math class or Bengali class, what about the marks on different subjects, what about class test result, what about next examination amd the like. Our students are not learning any social skills which is very import in their practical and future life. Interestingly none of us seem to be bothered about this.
Primary terminal examination results were published on 30 December 2014 which saw a drop in both the pass rate and the number of GPA-5 achievers. Junior School Certificate (JSC) and Junior, Dakhil Certificate (JDC) examinations witnessed a slight rise in the pass rate while the number of GPA-5 achievers came down. The pass rate for JSC and JDC this time stands at 90.41% which was 89.85% in 2013.This year the number of GPA 5 – the highest grade-point average – holders in JSC and JDC is 1,56,235 while it was 1,72,208 in 2013. The pass rate is 97.92 % in PSC and 95.98 % in Ebtedayee while last year the pass rate for PSC was 98.58% and for Ebtedayee 95.8 %. The GPA 5 achievers of PSC examinees this year is 2, 24, 411 while it was 2,40, 961 last year. However, the number of GPA 5 achievers declined in Ebtedayee exams.The results of this year’s Primary School Certificate show 97.92% pass rate. Results of PSC’s equivalent examination Ebtedayee were also published in which 95.98% students came out successful. This year a total of 26,28,083 students out of 26,83,781 passed the PSC while 2,55,273 students out of 2,65,974 came out successful in the Ebtedayee examinations.
The National Education Policy 2010 emphasises competency-based assessment of learning, moving away from memorisation, school-based continuing evaluation of students, and upazila-based assessment of system performance. The policy proposed only one national public examination for school education at the end of secondary education after grade twelve . But things and proposals like these have been buried. The JSC and its equivalent examinations began on November 7 whilethe PSC and its equivalent examinations were held between November 23 and 30.In Dhaka Board, Rajuk Uttara Model College has secured the top position with 99.32 points while Viqarunnisa Noon School obtained second position with 98.51 points. Ideal School and College, Motijheel secured the third position with 96.53 points, Shamsul Hoque KhanSchool and College fourth position with 95.01 points and Bir Shreshtha Noor Mohammad Public College the fifth position with 94.38 points.Jalalabad Cantonment Public School and College was crowned the top list of the best schools in this year’s Junior School Certificate (JSC) examination held under Sylhet Education Board attaining 92.68 points.Besides, 497, out of 501, students who sat for the exams at eight overseas centres came out successful with a pass rate of 99.20 percent. Of them, 138 obtained GPA-5. This is again a funny thing. What is the credit of these so-called famous schools? They admit all the best performers in their schools and after the admission all the students and guardians are compelled to undergo tremendous psychological and monetary pressure. At the cost of these phenomena, they get good grades. Even then, all the guardians stand in queue to get their children admitted to these institutions leaving behind the schools adjacent to their houses or near their homes. This mad competition must be avoided distributing the good teachers in all the city schools uniformly. Better teachers should be given more lucrative incentive to go to upazalia and village schools. The ministry of education must look into these matters very seriously not only remaining busy with distribution of books among the students. Actually many of the students don’t need free books when they can afford to maintain several tutors.
Issues cited here call for serious consideration and care. Like the previous year, Barisal has been ranked first among seven divisions, with 98.71 percent success rate. Sylhet is at the bottom of the list with 94.95 percent pass rate. Though research is going on with the issue of Sylhet, things are not changing. A total of 3,563 children with special needs took the exams and over 95 percent of them succeeded. How more students with special needs can be brought into mainstream education should be given serious consideration. Schools affiliated with Primary Training Institute saw more than 99.84 percent of their students pass the exams this year. It clearly shows that good and really trained teachers are absolutely necessary for giving quality education. Side by side, accountability of the teachers and looking after their welfare can ensure quality education .The government primary schools have adequate infrastructure and other facilities but their pass percentage is still not hundred percent, it is 98.30 percent. Asked why the government schools are lagging behind, the minister said the authorities would look into the matter. When they will look into? Every year same situation repeats in the government schools. Here proper accountability and management must be ensured at any cost.
(Masum Billah is manager, BRAC Education Programmme, and former faculty member of Sylhet, Comilla and Mirzapur Cadet Colleges and the Rajuk College. Email: masumbillah65@gmail.com)
