02 Dec 2014

Excellence must be recognised, celebrated and awarded, Botswana Examinations Council (BEC) executive secretary, Professor Brian Mokopakgosi has said.

Speaking at the sixth graduation and seventh prize giving of the Ramotswa English medium primary school on November 29, Professor Mokopakgosi said achievement of the young minds should serve as inspiration to others in order to achieve even higher.

He noted that the award of prizes fitted perfectly into the overall mandate of BEC of developing and administering primary and secondary examinations, which were used to monitor the achievement of learners and to assess the quality, relevance and equity in education at various levels.

He said BEC contributed to the national human resource development strategy through monitoring quality learning and education. Professor Mokopakgosi also said should parliament approve their recommendations, BEC would expand to include the assessment and moderation of technical and vocational training.

Prof Mokopakgosi said that the graduation ceremony takes place against the backdrop of several interesting development in the education sub-sector.

“These developments include that of education and training sector strategic plan, national outcry about learner performance in our school, decline in the education and skills development and lack of commensurate returns on investment in education,” he said.

Although Ramotswa English medium has helped push up the overall performance of the South East region, it does not do well in critical subjects such as mathematics, science and agriculture, he added.

For his part, the school principal, Mr Misheck Ncube, said that his school had registered a 100 per cent pass rate in the Primary School Leaving Examinations (PSLE) since 2009 to 2013. He said perhaps this year’ s results would prove the school’s real character since the standard sevens are the ones who opened the doors of the school. ENDS