Students now getting better results, says Foster-Allen

Elaine Foster-Allen, former permanent secretary in the Ministry of Education, has said that based on statistics, students attaining mastery of Grade Four Literacy Test and the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) examination has been steadily increasing over the last four years.

"When you look at literacy for Grade Four between 2014 and 2017, we have moved from 77.4 percent of our children being accounted as literate in 2014, to 86.4 percent in 2015; then in 2016, 79.1 percent; and in 2017, 84.6 percent," said Foster-Allen while giving the keynote address at the opening session of the Jamaica Teachers' Association's (JTA) 54th annual conference in Montego Bay, St James on Monday.

"CSEC results are also trending upward. In 2015, for Biology, 69 percent of students attained Grades 1 to 3, and it moved up in 2018 to 74.2. For English B, it was 68.5 percent in 2016, and [it moved to] 81.6 percent in 2018," said Foster-Allen.

“The Grade Six Achievement Test (GSAT) also saw more students passing in 2017 in comparison to 2015.”

Foster-Allen provided the following statistics:

* Mathematics - 62.4 percent of students passed the exam in 2017, compared to 56 percent in 2015
* Social studies - 70.6 percent in 2017, up from 69 percent in 2015
* Language arts - 72.8 percent in 2017, up from 64 percent in 2015
* Communication tasks - 77.6 percent in 2017, up from 74 percent in 2015

Foster-Allen heaped praised teachers for the improvements in examination results.

"These improvements did not drop out of the sky; they have all been dependent on the efforts of teachers across the length and breadth of our country, (sometimes) in conditions that are inimical to teaching and learning. Teachers, you have been ingenious, inventive, resourceful, and creative," stated Foster-Allen.

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