CONCERNS have emerged within National Commercial Bank (NCB) about the number of students failing to sit fifth-form exams sponsored through its education foundation, now that it has emerged that thousands were absent from this year’s tests.

Now the bank is reviewing data from the Ministry of Education to determine whether to continue subsidising the full exam fees for Principles of Accounts and Principles of Business.

“We are just getting information to see how many were absent or not,” said Pamela Harrison, coordinator of the NCB Jamaica Education Initiative (JEI).

“It will take a little time for us to go through, report, and see what will happen.” Together, NCB and the Jamaican government fully sudsidise exam fees for six Caribbean Secondary Education Certification subjects, and have done so since 2003.

There were more than 9,700 no-shows for exams in those subject areas this year – 3,929 of whom were absent for POB and POA – amounting to some $10 million in wasted fees.

Education ministry technocrats are also reviewing the raw data supplied by the Caribbean Examination Council (CXC), the agency that administers the CSEC exams, with communications director Dorrett Campbell saying for now they have no detailed explanation for the exam absences.

“We are still doing our analysis,” Campbell told the Sunday Observer. “We haven’t reached that far yet.”

The raw 2005 exam data show that 17 per cent of students who registered for POB, and another 14.5 per cent who were down to sit POA did not write their exams.

For English, it was six per cent and math, 10 per cent – both of which government subsidised.

No-show candidates are defined in two ways – students who are not recommended by their school to sit an exam as they have not completed the necessary preliminary coursework, and students who fail to turn up for an exam – but the CXC data does not differentiate between the two groups, making a proper analysis difficult.

“CXC needs to decide exactly (which students) are no-shows,” said Campbell. The schools are aware of the reasons for absences, but each has its own experience.

In a poll of St Hugh’s High, St George’s College, and Camperdown High, principals and senior teachers were surprised by the large number of students reported as no-shows, saying their own records show that the percentages of registered students who failed to write their exams, sponsored or otherwise, were low.

All three schools said, however, that some no-shows were the result of the students having migrated with their families to live overseas.

Camperdown principal Cynthia Cooke said her school made a special effort to ensure that registered students followed through to sit their exams, with only “an insignificant number” being absent.

Yvette Smith, principal of St Hugh’s, an all-girls school, says exam absentees are rare, because those who fail to sit their tests are denied their high school diploma.

According to Smith, as a result of this firm policy, most of their students sit the exams, with the majority of absentees due to girls enrolled in error.

On rare occasions, some students confuse exam timetables and show up after the allocated time has passed. And, there are also some students who choose to be absent from the exams if they expect to fail.

Subjects such as POB and POA, which this year had the highest percentage no-shows of the sponsored subjects, require a series of school based assessments (SBAs) that constitute a greater portion of the final grade than the exam itself.

Dwayne Campbell, the fifth form supervisor at St George’s, says those students who fail to complete their SBAs prefer not to sit the exams, as they know failure is inevitable.

“Frankly, in this case, I don’t blame them,” said Campbell.

Cooke took the opposite view, however, saying her policy is to ensure that all the necessary coursework is completed before the exam.

“We will lock them up and make sure they complete their SBAs,” she advised the Sunday Observer.

Without conclusive data as to why some students are absent from sponsored exams, Charmaine Wright, NCB corporate and media affairs officer, says the bank will not be making any hasty decisions.

“The foundation is meeting to determine a course of action, then they will take their recommendations to the board,” said Wright.

“We don’t want to make assumptions derived from a misconstrued analysis of statistics.”

The bank is not minded, she said, to suspend the benefit to thousands because of the actions of a minority.

A total of 27,179 students were registered for POB and POA this year.

“Our focus is on education and giving opportunities to students and that will always continue,” said Wright. “We see the benefits of our sponsorship and want to ensure that (students) are encouraged to study and develop business practices.”

barrettr@jamaicaobserver.com