Nahid calls for a rethink of putting test scores of 81 and 99 in the same grade

The education minister has questioned whether test scores of 80 and 100 marks in the public examinations should be put in the same grade.

“We need to think about differently evaluating scores of more than 80 in all subjects,” said Nurul Islam Nahid on Friday at a reception in Dhaka for the students who have aced SSC and HSC examinations with GPA-5.

“We will have to think more about these things whether we will keep so much gap. There’s a huge gap from 81 to 100. A student who gets 99 is treated equally with someone who gets 81.”

The minister continued, “It is now familiar among many that if a student obtains more than 80 marks in all subjects, he is considered golden GPA achievers. But it's not a formal one.”

Since 2001, for SSC tests and since 2003, for HSC examinations, the results are being evaluated in the Grade Point Average or GPA system.

In the current grading method for SSC and HSC tests, a student who scores between 80 and 100 marks gets GPA-5, and is called ‘A Plus’ performer.

While evaluating the final results, the total scores of all subjects are averaged. If a student scores 80 or higher in all subjects, he or she is considered a GPA-5 achiever.

On the question paper leaks in public examinations, the education minister said, “During the last SSC examinations, a situation was created to give the impression that all the questions have been leaked. No-one would believe us no matter what we would have to say.”

However, investigations revealed that no questions had been leaked. “Only 30 marks worth of MCQ of four papers had been leaked,” he said.

To stop this, students were made to enter test centres 30 minutes before the start of the examinations, he added.