Schoolchildren complain: ‘These are not my grades’

AFTER enduring months of anxiety awaiting a date for their exams, owing to the covid19 pandemic, CSEC and CAPE students breathed a sigh of relief when they were finally able to sit the exams for which they had been preparing for the past year.

But they were upset again on September 22, when exam results were released, with hundreds of students across the region complaining of being unfairly marked.

The bacchanal that followed led to the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) convening an independent review team to examine the administration of the exams. Many students are not satisfied with the council’s handling of the situation and continue to plead for a more compassionate response.

Newsday spoke to a few students who have been affected by the review. Their parents asked for them to remain anonymous.

“The (situation) is very disappointing,” said a lower six student of Presentation College, Chaguanas. “CXC should be way more organised and they should be handling the situation much more professionally and with a greater degree of concern.”

He said students worked hard for the exam and were given grades that were not representative of their efforts. The student that said, for the most part, was satisfied with his grades: one distinction, two grade ones and a grade two in chemistry.

He said he knows ones are a good grade, but from his internal assessment (IA) scores, which were near perfect, and how he felt coming out of the exams, he was expecting distinctions. He said his school has not yet submitted queries for individual subjects, but he paid to have his grade two in chemistry queried.

A VERY RUDE AWAKENING

He said CXC also has not said when students will receive the results of the review, which is also frustrating. “The school is already asking us to register for exams next year, so I need to know if I need to do over the exam or not.” In addition, he was in for yet another surprise this week.

In the early hours of Friday morning, one of his classmates visited the CXC online portal to check his grades in relation to an application for a school abroad. He noticed that his Caribbean studies unit one grade had been changed. The student immediately alerted his classmates in a group chat and the first boy realised his grade had been changed as well.

The disgruntled student gave Newsday a copy of his initial grades, which showed an overall grade of One in Caribbean studies, and individual profile grades of two As and a C. His new grade is now two, with individual profile grades of one A, one B and a C.

“It was very confusing to me, because if they were trying to maintain their integrity as a body, why not upgrade everyone’s grades and not downgrade it?”

On Friday evening, Minister of Education Nyan Gadsby-Dolly said CXC was unaware of the situation and said all those who were affected by the unexpected grade change should notify the local CXC registrar. “How could they not be aware of what is going on in their own examination body? That’s very disappointing.”

DEEP DEPRESSION

When asked if he thought the occurrence was a glitch or intentional, the student responded, “I would like to think that it was intentional. I would expect that an examination body like CXC would have an IT team to manage a website properly.

“This is not a small mistake. These are mistakes that are going to affect people’s mental health. These are not glitches that should be happening at all.”

Many other students have struggled to come to terms with the grades they received. In a letter obtained by Newsday by a science student at Trinity College, Maraval, he said based on his IA grades and his teachers’ predictions, he was expecting to receive ones and twos in his exams. Instead, he received two grade twos and two grade threes.

“These grades do not showcase the countless hours into the night I spent burning the midnight oil with my friends doing multiple-choice practice papers. I myself wrote the exams and I can say with certainty that those are not my grades.” He said the situation has sent him into deep depression, frustration and anger. “It broke me,” he said but added it gave him a sense of comfort to know he was not the only one in the region who had experienced the same injustice. “I was hoping to achieve a scholarship next year and attend one of my dream universities abroad but these results have set me back.”

A legal team, led by Keith Scotland and Darrell Allahar, representing several TT schools, sent CXC a pre-action protocol letter in September. The council responded last week, telling the lawyers to direct their concerns to TT’s CXC registrar.