NO DATE YET

NO date has been decided as to when the Barbados Secondary Schools’ Entrance Examination (BSSEE) will be completely abolished.
However, Acting Prime Minister, Santia Bradshaw said the ground work needed to transition away from this annual test has been laid. She also told reporters on Tuesday afternoon that “the paper on the [education] reform, I think, has been finally completed and is before the Prime Minister for consideration and then on to Cabinet, so I expect that those decisions will be made very shortly.”
Her comments came while speaking at the Springer Memorial Secondary School. This was one of the centres used by the approximately 3, 300 students who wrote this year’s Common Entrance Examination.
Bradshaw, who is the former Education Minister, said the move away from the 11-Plus exam “is not an overnight process”. She however outlined some steps that have already occurred. “People feel very near and dear to the Common Entrance Examination. It is what we
all have grown up accustomed to, and in order to make that transition, you have to change mindset. You have to improve the schools and we had to put in place the Director of Education Reform to work with the various institutions [and] the educators in order to help us to make that transition.”
She added, “So I would say that it is not an overnight process. The hard work has already started. The conversations have started.”
Bradshaw stated the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic did set back the Education Ministry “in terms of our conversations with the public, but that didn’t mean that behind- the-scenes the work was not going on to position ourselves to be able to make that transformation. So, I believe that at the ap- propriate time, the current minister would make the announcement in relation to the final date for the Common Entrance, but until then, I think we just have to continue to reform and transition education generally in Barbados.”
Providing an update on how this year’s BSSEE went for the 1,545 males and 1,755 females who took the day’s test at the 21 examination centres across the island, the Acting Prime Minister said all went well.
“From the preliminary reports that are coming back to us from the various centres, so far things have gone exceptionally well. Just listening to the students a few moments ago, the students seemed very excited. Most of the students have indicated that they have managed well and they didn’t find that the examination was super hard and they are looking forward most of all to the summer to be able to wind down and to be able to relax.”
A similar report was given earlier in the morning by Chief Education Officer, Dr. Ramona Archer-Bradshaw. She visited three schools up to that point and said the Education Ministry was “quite pleased with what we are seeing so far with the administration of the Barbados Secondary Schools Entrance Examination 2022.”
In her remarks, she took the time to thank staff of the Education Ministry, principals and teachers for the work put into getting the Class 4s ready to sit the day’s examination and to ready them for the transition from primary school to secondary school.