EDITORIAL - The 11-Plus dilemma
They say time flies when you are having fun, but for the hundreds of students that will sit the Common Entrance Examination – also known as the 11-Plus – in a few weeks’ time, they would probably argue that they have not had much fun as they have been preparing for that exam, and yet the time to face the music is fast approaching.
We are almost sure that most, if not all of those 11-year-olds are wishing that time would slow down or even that the clock could perhaps turn back, giving them more time to prepare. Short of some kind of disaster, natural or manmade, their wish is not likely to come true and they will then spend the weeks after the exam wondering, and perhaps fearing even more than the actual process of doing the exam, what their results will be and whether or not they have passed for the secondary school of their choice.
Every year around this time, as the schools push the children just a bit more and the parents shuttle their children to extra lessons practically every evening after school, the question of its relevance and importance is raised and many ask why. Why so much emphasis is placed on the 11-Plus; and why is the 11-Plus even still in place? Quite often another question that is asked by the public and social commentators, and this year we can add politicians, is whether the exam is still serving a useful purpose and if it should not now be revamped in an effort to better cater to the technologically and educationally advanced children of this nation.
This exam which seeks to weed out the “not so bright” from the “bright” students can very well put some students at a disadvantage, because society’s mindset is that the one-shot exam will ultimately decide their future. However, we want to suggest that it does not matter which secondary school you attend, it is what you do when you get there. Even if you fall down in the exam, there is nothing that says you have to stay down – pick yourself up and show everyone the stuff you are made of.
Also of note is that we grill these students on English and Mathematics, but we have to admit that not all students are academically inclined, and for those students, the 11-Plus is really a nightmare. We also cannot comprehend why we are testing children on English and Mathematics alone, when the primary school curriculum has itself surpassed that. So we may very well have to revamp the exam, perhaps even do away with it, and find a more comprehensive way of moving students from primary to secondary school.
That suggestion will likely fall on deaf ears, for in this country we like to do things the same way all the time and expect different results. We hope however that the authorities at least give some thought to this other suggestion we are putting forward – to let the students sit the exam at their respective schools. For decades now students sitting the 11-Plus have had to do the exam in unfamiliar settings, but we think that if they are allowed to do the exam in their own schools, and not an unfamiliar secondary school, it could help cut down on the anxiety many of them experience the day of the exam.
It can work! As it stands, don’t the secondary students writing examinations through the Caribbean Examinations Council do so at their own schools? So why not extend the same courtesy to the terrified 11-year olds who are writing the first major exam of their lives?