A number of changes are coming to the examinations administered by the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC), particularly with respect to the school-based assessments (SBA).

CXC registrar and chief executive officer Dr Didacus Jules says in the future, a group of students could work on an SBA project together, rather than each student submitting separate projects.

For example an Industrial Arts (woods) class could build a house for an indigent person, and this could qualify as their SBA.

“An SBA can be done in the future by an individual student, a group of students or an entire class,” he stated in his address at the Mico University College’s Science and Mathematics Teaching and Learning Conference at the Jamaica Conference Centre in Kingston last Monday.

Also coming is a transdisciplinary SBA, that is one SBA that covers a number of subjects such as the business cluster of subjects, the registrar disclosed.

Dr Jules said the SBA needed to achieve one of three things, namely:

* Application of knowledge

* Expression of creativity or innovation

* Expression of civic responsibility.

Also, participation in the Junior Achievement Programme, in which high school students start and operate businesses, would be a preferred SBA for students in the business cluster, Dr Jules said, adding that an SBA business could translate into a real business for students after leaving school.

In defending the record of the CXC, Dr Jules said the SBA model introduced 35 years ago is now being used in many countries, and is about to be introduced in Singapore.

“We have been doing this for 35 years, CXC was the first regional or international board to have school based assessments as an integral part of its assessment process,” Dr Jules said.

The CXC registrar also disclosed that the council has partnered with the University of the West Indies’ Open Campus to design a certificate in the teaching of every subject offered by the CXC at every level. This means a teacher could earn a certificate in the teaching of physics at the

Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE) level or the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) level for example. Commenting on what he said was the tendency towards over-testing in the Caribbean, including Jamaica, Dr Jules called on stakeholders to focus more on teaching and less on testing.

“You can’t make a pig fatter by weighing it more often,” Dr Jules said in borrowing a quote from United States president Barack Obama.

“We need to test less and spend more time on instruction, but we need to test judiciously and instructively.”