A post mortem is planned on this year’s Secondary Entrance Assessment (SEA) to chart a way forward for next year’s exam.
So said Education Minister Anthony Garcia who was responding to claims that with the abolishing of the Continuous Assessment Component (CAC) the SEA exam has now been moved to March next year.
But Garcia said that had not been determined.
He said if a decision had to be taken it would be done on the basis of information received and researched gathered from the post mortem.
“We cannot take a decision just like that. We also have to consult with our major stakeholders like the T&T Unified Teachers Association (TTUTA) and the National Parent Teacher Association (NPTA),” Garcia said.
Asked whether the exam was still expected to take place in May next year the minister said no decision had been taken.
“What I am saying is we are going to do a post mortem on the exam and when that is completed then we would decide where we are going.
“So I cannot say at this time whether it would be in May or whether it would be in April or whether it would be in March because we have not had that post mortem as yet,” Garcia said.
He said such a post mortem of the exam was expected to take place “pretty soon,” following which all the “ramifications” were expected to be looked at.
“It must be determined what is best for the teachers and the students and for the education system,” Garcia added.
Pressed whether there was a possibility that the date would change the minister said he could not say but reiterated the need for the post mortem.
What TTUTA said
TTUTA’s president, Davanand Sinanan, when contacted yesterday, said the union held preliminary talks with the ministry on the issue after which arguments were put forward why the exam should be pushed back to March and why it should remain in May.
On the reason why the exam should be moved to May, Sinanan said: “Some of the reasons are it facilitated the children participating in a lot of extra curricular activities in that third term bearing in mind that the preparation for SEA...a lot of that aspect of the curriculum is really sacrifice. That was one of the main planks of that argument.”
Regarding why it should be kept in May he said the argument was children would have more time to prepare.
On the creative writing aspect he said from all accounts it appeared it had gone back to the 40-minute format.
Last year, pupils focused on report writing in which pieces were submitted to the ministry for marking.
Saying there was no definite recommendations taken by TTUTA, Sinanan said he was also not aware of when the post mortem on SEA was expected to begin.
“The ministry is in this transition mode. We were supposed to have a meeting with them the last couple of weeks and we can’t even get a date because they are in this transition from St Clair to St Vincent Street,” Sinanan added.