Malawi’s education system has suffered a setback, with only 50.36 percent of its high school students who wrote the final exams passing the all-important tests, Education Minister William Susuwele-Banda announced on Monday.
Out of 92,837 students who sat for the exams, some 46,771 passed while out of the 98,332 who registered to write only 92,637 managed to sit for the exams.
According to the minister, the students’ poor performance was due to the government’s change of its curriculum in the 2018/19 academic year.
This left the teachers struggling to impart the new lessons to their students, he added, without blaming his government for the poor planning that led to the low results.
However, education expert Limbani Nsapato was not impressed with the minister’s reasons for the students’ failure to excel in the exams.
Speaking to the privately-owned Zodiak Broadcasting Station on Monday night, Nsapato said “it’s a disaster” for the country.
Nsapato said the government’s change to the new curriculum without proper and adequate preparations was one of the main reasons for the poor results by the students.
In addition, the education expert faulted the government for removing a lower grade test once offered in the second year of high school studies called the Junior Certificate Examination (JCE).
According to Nsapato, the JCE was instrumental in preparing final year high school students in doing well for their final year exams which are known as the Malawi School of Certificate Examinations, whose passing is a requirement to advance to university studies or technical training colleges.
NM/jn/APA