All students fail at ESM secondary

EASTERN PROVINCE NGOMA — The recently released national exams show there was a slight improvement in performance of primary six candidates in Ngoma district, but with a remarkable decline in the ordinary level exams. According to statistics obtained from the district, Primary Six performance rose from 12.9% in 2006 to 21.4% in 2007. Of the 3,022 pupils who sat for the exams, only 648(21.4%) passed. Meanwhile, the results indicate a decline in ordinary level performance from 29.3% in 2006 to 26.5% in 2007. Of 2,107 total number of students who sat for exams, 559 passed, representing paltry 26.5 percent. ESM Secondary in Kibungo Sector trailed other schools in the district with all 67 students who sat for exams failing, which is an average of 0.0 percent. The Ministry of Education and the Rwanda National Examination Council pass mark was 38 percent. Les Hirondelles primary school emerged the best in the whole district, all 27 (100%) pupils who sat for the exams passed. Sholi and Remera Primary schools emerged the second and the third with 75.0% and 53.3% respectively. Muzingira took the fourth position with an average of 52.2% while Gafunzo Primary School emerged the fifth with 52.2% average. However, EP Musya Primary school produced the best overall pupil in the district Yvette Umuhirwe who scored 66.70% average. The school is ranked 43 according to the district ranking. Munyampeta Smic of EP Mulinja emerged second with 62.30% while Niwemusa Sylivestre of EP Gafunzo and Hakizimana Melance of Les Hilondelles took the third and the fourth positions with 59.30% and 58.70% respectively. Petit Seminaire Zaza beat other schools in the ordinary level exams with 85.5% average. At least 53 students passed out of 62 who sat for the exams. ES Sake and GS Kabare took the second and the third positions respectively with the former having the average of 57.6% while the latter had 49.6% average. Zaza Sector emerged the best in ordinary level exams with 175 students passing out of 350 who sat in the whole Sector. While Kibungo sector trailed with only three students passing out of 193 who sat for ‘O’level exams. The best student Igirimbabazi Jonas of Petit Seminaire Zaza got 9 points followed by Kirezi Mireille of LYCEE Zaza with 8.7 points. Safari Alexandre of GS Kabare and Nzabananimana Elie of GS Zaza/ENP TTC took the third and the fourth positions with 8.6 and 8.3 respectively. In a separate interview with The New Times, the district director of schools Victor Jemadari expressed disappointment over the ordinary level results. “I want to convene a meeting of all directors of primary and secondary schools to establish the cause of the poor performance; in order to find a solution to reverse the trend,” Jemadari said. He added: “All schools in the country follow the same syllabus and they do the same exams; at the national level but I don’t know why we should not compete favorably with them. We should design ways to improve our performance in the forth coming exams.” Ends