SSC results expose yawning educational divide

The recently published Secondary School Certificate (SSC) results have raised more questions than can be answered. A drop of 14.95 per cent in the pass rate from the last year's 83.04 per cent has triggered a debate not only among the general public but also among educationists. Some hold the view that the inflated pass rate and the number of grade point average GPA-5 achievers of the past few years have now come to a pragmatic level courtesy of genuine ---read strict ---evaluation. Others are of the opinion that a combination of negative factors beyond the examinees' control was responsible for the result reversal this year. 

Indeed, here is a generation often referred to as a lost band of young population starting from the entry level kindergarten kids to secondary and higher secondary students who endured the pandemic trauma and the process of unlearning because of corona shutdown and post-Covid economic hardship for many in countries like Bangladesh. This year's examinees were in class VI at the time of corona virus's rampage. Their learning gap in foundational education is common knowledge. 

Moreover, this is the first batch of SSC examinees which has appeared at examinations on the full syllabus. But the question is, have they been adequately prepared for the demanding first public examination? The answer is a big No. Except the few reputed urban schools, most other educational institutions in small towns and villages are handicapped by constraints starting from incompetent teaching staff and a lack of multimedia facilities. Unreliable power supply also does not help the cause of such schools. 

The much vaunted learning recovery programme never got going and instead there were political unrest, natural calamities like floods and cyclone which severely affected schooling in several areas of the country. There was a month-long closure of schools in January 2022. During the past five years, these learners did not have the opportunity of attending half the days of classroom teaching of the total scheduled for them. Failure in Mathematics and higher Mathematics has reportedly been responsible for the lower pass rate this year. Then the leniency shown in evaluation of examination scripts for successive years following the pandemic was no longer pursued; instead examiners were instructed to be strict in marking answer papers. The evaluation process still remains subjective because examiners are not trained well to evaluate examination scripts in a uniform manner. When a large number of teachers even could not prepare questions known as the creative type, how can they be relied on for objective evaluation of answers?

What is quite surprising is that even a few educational institutions in Dhaka City boasting enviable results year after year have faltered this year. Not only has the number of GPA-5 achievers dropped but also a significant number of examinees have failed. At least two such schools have exposed the downside of their vaunted legacy of SSC results. Sure enough, the lottery system of admission at the entry point may have something to do with it. But then the more important question is the inability of even the best in the business to impart education. They failed to pay enough attention to the special need of the laggards.

When it comes to the disparities existing between the well managed, full-fledged and well-furnished band of educational institutions located mostly in urban centres including the cadet colleges and the skeletal schools in villages casually run by an indifferent managing committee and teaching staff with questionable teaching quality and skills, student performances cannot but show the gulf of difference. Underprivileged and subjected to the worst socio-economic disparities, students of schools with the barest minimum facilities cannot be expected to shine in examination. Only in rare cases, there emerges one or two extraordinary talent/s from such a background. 

Now the leaders of the quota-movement fame known for championing anti-discrimination have never raised this issue of atrocious discrimination facing their junior learners. If any discrimination in society demands top priority, it is this yawning gap in education imparted at educational institutions depending on their locations. Even if a semblance of uniform standard in education at the primary, secondary education system could be brought about by investing more in the discriminated against educational institutions, it would have been a great service to the nation. Had the coordinators and leaders of the quota movement who eventually led the uprising precipitating the fall of Hasina government demanded enough budgetary allocations for starting, at least, the process of reducing the gap between and among educational institutions, it would take the process ahead. The student leaders could act as influencers to leave a permanent footprint in terms of reducing discrimination in education.        

Unfortunately, nothing happened of this order. The elitist stance is not foreign to the student leaders now leading their own political party. True, they are still vociferous about reform which, they think, will bring an end to the political process of making elected government repressive and autocratic. But they must as well have something fundamental to show as a pragmatic programme with the potential of eliminating socio-economic inequality and disparities. Or, how can their credentials be tested? Unless, equal opportunities for education are open to the underclass, achieving social equanimity is impossible. The SSC and HSC results are a glaring testament to the discriminatory education system under which the students of poor and regressive backgrounds lose their ways in wilderness with no hope of getting integrated into the mainstream society. 

nilratanhalder2000@yahoo.com