While acknowledging improvements in the area of Mathematics at this year’s National Grade Six Assessment (NGSA), President David Granger said he is unhappy with the results in English, Science, and Social Studies.
In a video posted on the A Partnership for National Unity +Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC) Facebook page, the Head of State said, “More children are doing well in Mathematics, although I’m not happy with the results in English, Science, and Social Studies.”
Granger noted that despite this, his government has been making significant progress in getting children off the streets and into schools. He added that the government over the past four years has been able to raise a “large part” of the student population out of what he explains as “the danger of becoming NEETS.” NEETS, he explains, is an acronym for “[Students] not in education, employment, or training.”
He further stated that there are now fewer dropouts and fewer failures.
The President further expressed confidence in the amount of monies the administration has invested in education, and that students will do better in the years to come.
“Over $172B was spent over the last four years on education alone. This is more than we’ve spent on any other single sector in government. So, this is the most important service, public service that we can provide to our citizens,” He said.
He extended his congratulations to the students who wrote this year’s NGSA and also expressed congratulations to the teachers and parents.
Of the 14,300 students that sat this year’s NGSA, 61% of candidates were unable to pass in Social Studies while for Mathematics and Science the fail rates were 58% and 57.6%, respectively.
This translates to 39% passing Social Studies; 42.4% Science; and 42% Mathematics.
Using the numbers provided by the Ministry of Education, Guyana Standard was able to conclude that of the 14,300 pupils that wrote the NGSA, 8,723 candidates (61%) were unable to pass Social Studies; 8,236 (57.6%) candidates were unable to pass Science; and 8,294 (58%) were unable to pass Mathematics.
With regards to English, performance in this area was “stable”, Minister of Education, Dr Nicolette Henry, had stated.
She reported that for this year, 57.4% of the candidates passed, as compared to 2018 when 60.6% of candidates were able to achieve the minimum pass rate of 50%.
