Students: CAPE and CSEC exams free from hiccups

Diara Guy and Kyamani McPhie, students of Presentation College, San Fernando, talk about their first CXC exam on Monday. - Chequana Wheeler
Diara Guy and Kyamani McPhie, students of Presentation College, San Fernando, talk about their first CXC exam on Monday. - Chequana Wheeler

Despite the “new normal” owing to the coronavirus pandemic, Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) and Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE) students in San Fernando said exams went on as normal and without any hiccups.

“I am accustomed to sanitising and the other guidelines regarding prevention of the virus. Everything was normal. The exam was not challenging as I thought it would have been,” said Zian Ramjohn of St Benedict’s College in La Romaine.

The CAPE student, who lives in Moruga, sat the Management of Business (MOB) paper one exam. Covid19 health and safety guidelines like physically distancing were adhered to, Ramjohn said. He said students’ temperatures were checked before entering the examination room. No one was turned away.

Schoolmate Reece Ramjass told Newsday he too wrote MOB and except for the last two questions, the others were repeated ones.

Ramjass said, “The last two required us to do a little more thinking. But we got through. Everything went normal and good.”

Niasha Mungal, 16, a form five at ASJA Girls’ College in San Fernando, wrote the paper two in French. The CSEC student said everyone was spaced-out and wearing masks.

“Only after we were seated for the exam, we were allowed to take it off,” Mungal said.

Mungal said she studied and was prepared to sit the exam which she described as good.

CSEC students Kyamani McPhie and Diara Guy, of Presentation College in San Fernando, said initially they were nervous about performing in front of an examiner.

However, after they met and interacted with her, they felt relax and performed to the best of their abilities.

Both had music practical.

McPhie, of Gasparillo, sang Impossible Dream (in a baritone voice).

“I had the butterflies in my stomach but after talking to the examiner, she lessened them. It was great,” he said.

Guy of La Romaine played Valz Venezolano (Venezuelan waltz), a musical, on a tenor pan. He felt the same. Like McPhie, Guy said no students showed signs or symptoms of the virus.

Guy said: “While we were waiting for our turn to perform, we were practising physical distancing. There are washbasins on the compound and the CAPE students were on the other side. Everything went smoothly.”

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