For experts, drop in HSC success rates is a sign of return to the right course

A drop in the average pass rate and number of candidates who have secured maximum grade point average or GPA in HSC exams this year may have disappointed many, but teachers and educationists view the results as ‘realistic’.

They see a sign of return to the right path after questions were raised over the standards of education due to ‘abnormal’ rise in pass rate and question paper leaks.

Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid is breathing a sigh of relief over the success in effectively plugging the question paper leaks after years of strenuous efforts.

“No-one has raised questions about the exams this year. No scope to call the exams into question was there,” Nahid said while publishing the results on Thursday.

The pass rate of HSC and equivalent exams has fallen to 66.64 percent this year by 2.27 percentage points from 68.91 percent a year ago.

A total of 29,262 students have achieved a GPA of 5.0, compared with 37,969 in 2017. The number of GPA-5 achievers has fallen by 8,464.

An overhaul of the exam method to stop question paper leak and using uniform multiple choice question or MCQ papers for all boards impacted the results, people related to the exams said.

Rasheda K Choudhury, Executive Director, Campaign for Popular Education or CAMPE, however, is not ready to call the results bad.

In her words, the success rates are stabilising.

“Success rates in public tests always fluctuate everywhere in the world. It never rises all the time anywhere. We had experienced an abnormal trend, but now it is stabilising,” she told bdnews24.com.

The former adviser to a caretaker government also thinks the evaluation of answer scripts has improved this year with the training of teachers.

Another former adviser to the caretaker government, Hossain Zillur Rahman, said improvement of exams method changed the results.

“We can’t judge standards of education only by pass rate. Quality of classroom lessons and teachers should also be taken into account,” he said.

 

Prudent management

Question papers of public exams were leaked on the eve and on the morning of public exams on the social media platforms and messaging apps like Facebook, Messenger and WhatsApp.

A committee formed by the government found MCQ papers of 12 of 17 subjects were leaked during the SSC exams this year.

Facing widespread criticism, the education ministry overhauled the HSC exam method and the tests ended without any allegation of leaks, drawing praise from Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

“The exam method used this year is an excellent system. Examinees went to halls half an hour prior to the exams, and only 25 minutes before the tests, examiners were told which set of questions would be distributed. It prevented students from adopting unfair means,” she said at a programme where Nahid handed her the results.

The other steps taken during this year’s HSC exams included use of three officials for taking question papers from treasuries to centres and strengthened monitoring by law-enforcing and other agencies.

“Exam management was better this time than it was in the past few years. Perhaps, that caused the drop in pass rate,” said Ziaul Haque, Chairman of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education Board, Dhaka.

“We are happy with the results on the whole. It is a sign that we are moving towards qualitative change,” added Ziaul, who also heads the inter-board coordination sub-committee.

Evaluation on the ‘right track’

There has not been much change in the results of Notre Dame College, but for the principal of one of the country’s top colleges, the drop in average pass rate is ‘normal and positive’.

This year’s HSC exams were different because the culture of question paper leak and cheating of the past few years was absent, Father Hemanto Pius Rozario said. "I believe evaluation of answer scripts was also better this time,” he added.

“I believe this is a realistic outcome. Transparent results of transparent exams. This will make the students understand that there is no alternative to study,” the Notre Dame College principal told bdnews24.com.

Examiners ‘might have overlooked many things’ and checked answer scripts ‘liberally’ in the past, but that has not happened this year, said Motijheel Ideal School and College Principal Shahan Ara Begum.

“This is good. Evaluation was correct this year,” she said.

RAJUK Uttara Model College Associate Professor Md Solayman Kabir agreed.

“Whatever the results are, everyone is happy for the proper evaluation. Question paper leaks mar the value of merit. That’s a bad practice,” he said.