Performance in SSC examinations

This year's Secondary School Certificate (SSC) and equivalent examination was important on several counts. But the most outstanding certainly was the holding of the examination for all the subjects with full syllabuses after the pandemic that forced either reduction of subjects or syllabuses. It is also important that the candidates have perhaps appeared for this first public examination under the existing curriculum for the last but one time. Then the results of the previous year examination were in general worse than 2022. So, there was a heightened interest in the performance of examinees this year. Happily, they have not disappointed the nation. Examinees of the nine general education boards have done better by raising the bar to a reasonable level both in terms of percentage of pass and grade point average (GPA) 5.0 achievers. However, examinees under the Technical Education Board and the Madrasah Education Board could not match their performances both in terms of pass rates and GPA scorers with their counterparts under the general education boards.

Of the several positives of this year's SSC results, quite a gratifying one is the comparative much better performance in English and Mathematics---subjects that proved the Achilles heel for students at this and other levels before. Whether special care was taken for improving skills in these two subjects or the questions set were simpler is yet to be known. But there is no alternative to keeping up with this good work. Yet another positive development ---now discernible as a silent revolution---has been taking place in the option girls make for the science group. In a departure from the past choice for the humanities subjects, girls are not only increasingly opting for physical and biological sciences, they are outperforming boys. This is on top of the overall higher pass rate of 85 per cent for female students with a total of 89,168 GPA achievers as against 82.39 per cent for male students with 74,677 GPA scorers respectively. Had boys and the examinees of the Technical Education Board and the Madrasah Education Board matched their performances with those of girls, the results would look much brighter and better.

The stellar performance by girls is certainly heart-warming but at the same time the consistent slide in boys' performance over the past few years cannot but give a cause for serious concern. It is quite revealing that girls not only outnumber boys at the SSC level but also in Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) courses in the medical colleges. Also it has almost become customary for female students to achieve top positions in examinations of higher studies in universities. There is no reason to think that merit is gender-based, it is the opportunities or a lack of those together with the mindset such as concentration level and application of knowledge that determine the outcomes of examinations and contribution to society.

On that count perhaps male students with their better opportunity for experiencing the existing hard reality get disillusioned and even derailed. Without mincing words, it can be said that young learners have been subjected to one after experiment like guinea pigs in the name of educational reform. Even the latest overhauled curricula dubbed life situation-based may miss the objective if not for its merit but at least for not handing the task to an army of qualified teachers. Also the yawning gaps between and among education institutions as reflected in zero pass for 51 schools and madrasahs demand immediate attention for redress. Let the successful students carry on to expand their horizon.