By Latrishka Thomas
The Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) has reported concerning trends observed in the 2024 examinations, including increased incidents of cheating for the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) and a rise in absenteeism for the Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE).
CXC noted a troubling surge in examination irregularities.
Nicole Manning, CXC’s Director of Operations, said, “We had someone impersonating another candidate. And you’re finding that they’re coming, trying to pass off as another candidate. That’s not good, but it happened, right?” Manning said.
“The situation was identified and the candidate is not only disqualified, but debarred for two years. So, it’s a very serious matter,” she confirmed.
Overall, CXC documented 54 such incidents this year, up from 36 in 2023.
“And candidates have to sign to agree, yes, this is what happened. So, we’re not just making it up. The supervisors and invigilators are not making it up. They are telling you, I did this, as well as they are caught, literally, with the phone looking. One candidate said they were Googling the question,” Manning elaborated.
CAPE saw six irregularities in 2024 compared to 17 the prior year, while CSEC skyrocketed from 19 incidents in 2023 to 49 in 2024.
According to Manning, the CAPE exams also saw a jump in absenteeism rates, going from 4.14 percent in 2023 to 5.03 percent this year.
Manning noted that the CSEC absenteeism rates remained relatively steady at 6.66 percent in 2024 compared to 6.9 percent the previous year.
She pointed out particular areas of concern, such as the Green Engineering Unit 2, which had the highest recorded absenteeism at 15 also.
“It’s concerning to us because we see subjects, for example, lowest, yes, for the agricultural area, but areas like visual arts and so on, we saw the highest level of absenteeism [for CSEC],” she added.
She therefore stressed the importance for “member states to do that analysis against what is important for your industry to thrive”.
On the CSEC front, Manning revealed that the council had conducted surveys to understand the top reasons for the absenteeism, which included “personal emergencies, not being adequately prepared, documented illnesses, death in the family, and some candidates even preferred not to attend”.
