Fewer Do Maths, Science in English

By Nisha Sabanayagam

PUTRAJAYA: There is about a nine per cent drop in the number of students who answered fully in English in the Mathematics and Science papers of the Penilaian Menengah Rendah (PMR) examination.

But the Education Ministry is not pressing the panic button just yet. Education director-general Datuk Dr Ahamad Sipon, who announced the analysis of the results yesterday, said although there was a percentage drop, there was still a large number of students who opted to answer in English.

“This year’s figures of 24.1 per cent represents 108,227 students,” he said, adding that students would always choose to write their answers in the language they were comfortable with.

“This is a positive indication for the PPSMI (Teaching and Learning Science and Mathematics in English Programme).”

Pass rates in key subjects stayed roughly the same as last year’s results.

The pass rate for English this year was 71.4 per cent, comparable to last year’s 73.8 per cent, a marginal drop of 1.2 per cent.

Other key subjects which showed marginal decreases in pass rates were History, Geography and Mathematics.

In Mathematics, for instance, the pass rate dropped 1.3 per cent from last year’s pass rate of 84.1 per cent.

Key subjects that showed an increase in the pass rate but remained in the 90 percentile range, included Bahasa Melayu (an increase of 0.5 per cent), Islamic Studies (0.2 per cent) and Science (an improvement of 0.1 per cent from last year’s pass rate of of 90.1 per cent).

Ahamad said the overall stability of results, especially for the PPSMI, should be viewed positively.

“There has been no drastic change in the pass rates in the past three years, and this should be regarded as a success.”

Pass rates for Mathematics in the last three years have been in the 80 percentile range, while the pass rate for Science in the past two years has been in the 90 percentile range.

A total of 448,324 candidates sat the PMR this year.

Half of the 16 subjects, showed an increase in the number of As achieved this year. They included key subjects like Geography, History, Islamic Studies and Mathematics. Islamic Studies topped the list, with 4.5 per cent more As scored this year.

Key subjects such as English and Bahasa Melayu showed a decrease of 0.7 per cent in the number of As scored while Science showed a decrease of 1.4 per cent.

There were also more students scoring straight As this year – 22,979 candidates who scored As in all seven, eight or nine subjects they sat for.

Ahamad said the ministry would carry out a post-mortem on the failure of 524 students to pass the PMR examination.

“The number is low, so we will have to figure out a way to address the issue,” he said, adding that the students would go on to Form Four in their schools.

He encouraged them to take up vocational classes.

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