Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga is confident that the system is adequately prepared to run the 2016 grade 12 exams.
|||Pretoria – The Council of Education Ministers (CEM) is confident that the system is adequately prepared to run the 2016 grade 12 national senior certificate examinations and “it is all systems go” ahead of the start of the exams on October 26, Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga said on Sunday.
In a statement on the outcomes of Thursday’s CEM meeting, she said there were 677 141 registered full-time and 150 183 part-time candidates in the 2016 exams – 9000 more than 2015.
KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng again had the largest enrolments with 169 769 and 112 069 respectively. Limpopo had 102 618, and the Eastern Cape had 89 740 candidates registered for the 2016 grade 12 exams.
“One of the developments that we are very excited about, as CEM, and which is definitely worth noting is that we have seen a significant uptake in pure mathematics as opposed to maths literacy. Thus meaning our interventions in the promotion of mathematics as a subject choice is bearing fruit,” Motshekga said.
The CEM – which consists of the minister, the deputy minister, and the nine provincial education MECs – had also discussed the interventions made to ensure that there was not another leak of any examination papers as was the case in Limpopo last year. All storage points across the country would be audited to ensure that they met the minimum security standards. Storage points that did not comply would not be allowed to store the papers.
“In terms of learner readiness, the director general and I have been on a national roadshow visiting all provinces as part of our broader monitoring and support programme to provinces.
“We have seen some provinces tracking learner performance data from the beginning of the year and we are confident that by the time learners sit for the final exam they will be adequately prepared,” Motshekga said.
African News Agency (ANA)