The whole system of education has been damaged beyond repair under the present government. The examination results at pre-university levels are manipulated at the direction of higher authority.
Even manipulation could not hide the fact that the overall JSC examination results this year suffered a significant fall both in terms of the pass rate and the number of highest achievers.
The pass percentage of the Junior School Certificate (JSC) exams under the eight education boards came down to 83.10 percent, a 9.79 percentage points drop from last year’s, mainly due to a poor show in Comilla Board and students’ dismal performance in English and Mathematics.
The number of eighth graders achieving the highest grade — GPA 5 — also came down, to 1,84,397 from last year’s 2,35,059.A sharp fall of around 27 percentage points in the success rate in Comilla Board pushed down the overall pass rate, officials said. The examinees in three other boards also performed badly in English and Maths, contributing to the lower success rate.
The pass rate in the primary terminal exam also hit a six-year low with 95.18 percent kids coming out successful, down from 98.51 percent last year. The number of GPA-5 scorers came down to 2,62,609 from 2,81,898 the previous year.
All exams of 2017 were marred by widespread allegations of question paper leak. In some districts question papers were available on social media hours before the tests. Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid could not say why the pass rate fell while Primary and Mass Education Minister Mostafizur Rahman termed the results “satisfactory”.
But an analysis of the results indicates that a poor performance of the students in Comilla Board and students’ performance in English and Mathematics in other boards led to the fall in the overall pass rate. Students of Comilla Board also performed badly in this year’s SSC and HSC examinations, pushing down the overall pass rates in those exams.
Dhaka Board Chairman agreed that the pass rate fell because of poor show in English and Maths. However, “proper evaluation” of answer scripts and floods in some districts also played a role, he said.
If the fall in the pass rate is due to better checking by teachers then it is something which should continue – there is no need to over inflate scores to give students a false sense of accomplishment. Teachers are expected to give their all in terms of dedication and attitude – yet they remain on the 14th level of the National Pay Scale. Education expenditure remains at around 2 percent of GDP – a dismal number.
Politicisation is destroying all the good institutions essential for building a good nation. Most harmful victim was the education system of the country. Education Ministry is a model of incompetence.
