Fear of electoral violence has forced the National Department of Education to defer several national examinations.
Education Secretary, Dr Uke Kombra, announced yesterday that the first Grade 12 National Examination set for next Monday has been deferred to the second week of August because of the unrest in the National Capital District (NCD) this week.
It is responsible for us to defer the exams. The Written Expression that is set for Monday, August 1, will now be conducted on Monday, August 15.
We have deferred the examination dates by two weeks so exams will now be conducted on Monday, August 15.
We hope and pray that the two (2) weeks will be sufficient for wherever the counting is taken place to be completed and schools can resume, students can settle in well, hopefully have more conducive environment for students to sit for their written expression exams.
The Grade 12 and 10 national examinations happen in two parts, the first is the Written Expression Examinations for Grade 10s, 12s and the final one is in October starting on the 10th – that’s the objective test.
We start with grade 10s’ and then on October 17 will be the grade 12s’ and the week after that on October 24 will be grade 8s’ examination.
The other exams that happen before is the written expression examinations which for grade 10 have already been conducted and now we are due for the grade 12 examinations. The question papers are in schools already, we have distributed them.
We are asking all these authorities, individuals and school principals who have had the exam questions to be held in a more secure place so that they can be issued to the students on Monday August 15. This year we are expecting 32, 206 students to sit for their grade 12 written expression exams.
Dr Uke Kombra, Education Secretary