The education ministry has admitted that there is inconsistency in the way that students’ high school transcripts are being prepared and says it will establish a framework that will standardise the process to make it easier for transfer of the information.

The ministry was responding to a Jamaica Observer query following on the newspaper’s series of stories, starting on April 10, exposing the nightmare that many of the island’s bright high school graduates have been experiencing with poorly prepared transcripts.

The issue, which has been affecting students for many years, was brought to public attention by respected scientist and educator Dr Dennis Minott, who had stated that the problem was “severe” and charged that in some cases school officials’ actions are calculated.

“I would say 80 per cent of Jamaican students applying to colleges in the United States — even brilliant, high-achieving, excellent students — have no chance of getting in because their transcripts, as well as their profiles, are badly prepared,” Dr Minott had told the Observer. “Their school records are really not available to the colleges or themselves, and that is by negligence, but also in a growing number of cases it is very deliberate.”

Some school administrators, he said, “will outright tell children ‘I see no reason why you should go to any other university outside of Jamaica’ ”.

“There are people below the level of principal who can get into the whole train of student records and ruin the chances of children, and they know; they know that they can either translate their grades badly and present their stuff late, and also outright omit things, and fight when the children point out that the transcripts are in error in terms of omitting things. They will say ‘No’, they’re not changing it, and it’s quite a fight to correct it. And when they do correct it, out of spite they will deliberately submit them late,” Dr Minott charged.

Adding that some principals are guilty of this conduct as well, Dr Minott said that they are allowed to get away with it because there is no accountability.

“The education inspectorate is inspecting schools but is not looking at how well school records are kept or how well school records are delivered to the next stage of the education process,” he said.

Asked to respond to Dr Minott’s charge, the education ministry said it would seek to address the matter with principals and provide the required training support in the best interest of students.

“The National Education Inspectorate has identified the dissonance in the collection of data on students’ academic performance, as well as personal and social development, and has been making recommendations for improvement at the school level and the system level. These recommendations will guide the framework for the standardisation of data collected across all schools,” the ministry said in an e-mail response on the weekend to the Observer.

“Within this framework, provisions will also be made for the establishment of a qualifications framework to facilitate easy transfer of credentials and the determination of the equivalence of acquired certifications.

“We will also research further to see how digital technology can assist us, in the short term, to ensure that schools are equipped with the requisite technology to drive their data management processes,” the ministry added.

Dr Minott — founder and CEO of A-QuEST, which has been preparing top Jamaican students for colleges abroad since 1987 and has scored many big successes — had pointed to one principal at a rural Jamaica school who, he said, has over the past 12 years been consistent in not helping students.

“I have seen her do this to several students, including one student who recently came first or second at her school with nine grade ones and then went on to Campion [College] sixth form and got grade one in every single subject in CAPE [Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination],” Dr Minott said.

He had explained that, while Campion prepared the student’s transcript well, she didn’t have a similar experience with administrators at her former school in rural Jamaica.

“This child was properly messed up. Her mother and others tried to intervene but the principal wouldn’t help,” he said.

On the weekend, the ministry said that, based on its supervision of data, most, if not all high schools are using an electronic school management system (SMS) to archive data on students’ performance and a printed copy of the records are enclosed on the students’ personal files after each assessment cycle.

“Students do not have access to the SMS. However, the reports generated by same are provided to students after each formal assessment cycle. The data on the reports are used to generate the transcripts, but transcripts are between institutions. Sometimes the delayed response of the school to the request from the students for the transcript to be prepared can become problematic for the students, especially where scholarships are involved,” the ministry said.

“We are not aware of a school that does not have an established records facility where the students’ files are kept and where the records are not being updated as this is a routine activity once the reports have been issued to parents,” the education ministry added.

However, it acknowledged that “There may be challenges in converting the records or translating the scores to the international transcript standards as the expectations are different. This is an area that persons, usually an administrative officer or the guidance counsellor in the high school has to learn to do, and, perhaps, this is where the gap is.”

The Observer stories, particularly that reporting the ordeal of former Westwood High School Head Girl Shadee Morrison, have ignited intense debate among readers, some of whom have said they had a similar experience.