O/L results:

53 percent of candidates qualify for A/Ls

by Prasanna AMARANAYAKE and Dinesh ALWIS

Of the 272,640 school candidates who faced the GCE O/L examination in 2009, 143,000 (53 percent) candidates have qualified to follow studies for the Advanced Levels. However, 129,640 (47 percent) candidates have failed to qualify for the A/Ls.

The achievement standards in 2009 show a three percent drop in the number of candidates who qualified for Advanced Level education compared to 2008.

"It is a kind of a crisis in the education system. The problem is not the pass rate, but the high failure rate. There should be more focus on O/L failures", Commissioner General of Examinations, Anura Edirisinghe said. In 2009, the number of school candidates who obtained "A" passes in all nine subjects was 2,039 compared to the 2,075 candidates in 2008.

In 2009, 18,997 (seven percent) candidates obtained weak passes in all nine subjects; this was 17,564 in 2008.

Edirisinghe said, "The present classroom education system does not encourage students in various capacities to meet the needs of this country.

"Job-oriented subjects should be introduced into the new syllabi. The school based assessment system should be strengthened with a proper recording system."

Referring to Government policies on developing school education in Sri Lanka, he said the Government under the Mahinda Chinthana Idiri Dakma is focused on introducing a productive and mature education scheme.Though the percentage of passes in many subjects at the O/Ls is high, the pass percentages of core subjects such as Mathematics, Science and English language are relatively low.

The percentage of candidates who passed in English language was 28 in 2009.

The percentage of students who passed in Mathematics remained the same for 2008 and 2009, at 51. The percentage of candidates who passed Science was 45 in 2009 compared to 47 percent in 2008.

According to the Department of Examinations, despite the drop in achievement standards at the O/L examination in 2009, there has been a gradual increase of the percentage of students who qualify to sit for the Advanced Level since 1994.

The school-based assessment process seems to have contributed much towards the process in the examination results.Commissioner of Examinations Research and Development, Gayathri Abeygunasekara said the Department of Examinations has planned to introduce prototype question papers for O/L students to make them aware of changes in the structure of question papers and the type of questions before August.

The Department of Examinations will complete its 'Item bank program' to standardise the process of question paper designing for O/L and A/L examinations by 2013.