Over 280,000 candidates started their Primary Leaving Examinations (PLEs) across Rwanda on Monday morning, with education officials reporting that the exercise has kicked off smoothly.
The State Minister for Primary and Secondary Education, Isaac Munyakazi, launched the exams in the Kimisagara suburb of Kigali where all primary school leavers are sitting five exams on Kinyarwanda, Social Studies, Mathematics, English and Science.
In this year’s PLE, female candidates are dominating with 131,748 boys against 154,339 girls, the ministry said in a statement.
Rwandan officials said the Ordinary Level (Senior Three) and Advanced Level (Senior Six) candidates are expected to start their exams on 12, through 19 November.
Commenting on this year’s enrollment, Rwanda’s Minister of State in the Ministry of Education, Isaac Munyakazi said the number of students sitting for the exams are increasing, showing the benefits of the government’s efforts toward ensuring pupils complete their primary education.
Rwanda operates on a 6-3-3-4 school system, which translates as six (6) years for primary school, three (3) years for ordinary level (junior secondary school), three (3) years for advanced level (senior secondary school) and four (4) years for university Bachelor’s degree.
Currently, three official languages of instruction including English, French and Kinyarwanda are being used in the education system.
But Rwandan officials have recently receommended a curriculum that enables schools to teach pupils from Primary One to Three exclusively in Kinyarwanda for all subjects.
Rwandan education officials argue that in learning situations where both the teacher and the learner are non-native users of the language of instruction, the former struggles as much as the latter particularly at the start of education.
CU/as/APA