Draft Pupil Performance Report, Class XII: If the marks scored in board examinations by students are any indicator of the quality of education in a school, then Trashitse higher secondary school in Womrong, Trashigang was the best school in Bhutan last year.

That’s because the highest number of class 12 passed students that were selected for undergraduate studies in the 10 colleges under the Royal University of Bhutan are from Trashitse higher secondary school.

Of the total 1,521 students that were selected to study the 43 courses, 68 percent are students from Trashitse high school, the draft pupil performance report (PPR) by the Bhutan Council for School Examinations and Assessment (BCSEA) showed.

If Trashitse students have taken most of the college seats in Bhutan, then its students of Yangchenphug higher secondary school in Thimphu that have won the highest number of undergraduate scholarships abroad, the report states.

This “winning of scholarships” could also indicate that YHS was one of the best schools last year.

Of the 214 scholarship candidates, 39 are YHS students, 28 are students of Drugyel high school, 20 are from Jigme Sherubling high school in Trashigang, and 16 are from Trashitse high school.

Among the private schools, eight students from Ugyen Academy, and one from Kelki high school, won the scholarships.

Even though schools in Thimphu are assumed to be better than the rest, going by the admission pressure it sees every year, Thimphu doesn’t feature on the list, when the performances of schools are compared dzongkhag wise.

Schools in eastern Bhutan performed better than the schools in other parts of the country.

Trashiyangtse performed well in biology and history; Pemagatshel performed well in commerce and geography; Trashigang performed well in Dzongkha and mathematics; Trongsa performed well in physics and Wangduephodrang performed well in Dzongkha Rigzhung.

Schools in Lhuentsi, the dzongkhag, which is considered as one of the least developed in the country, performed well in economics.  Overall, students however did not do well in economics.

The report, said the examinations secretary Dr Phub Rinchhen, provides indications about the effectiveness of the examination, and highlights area that need to be supported. “We’ve been analysing the results for the last five years, and schools take these feedback very seriously,” he said.

For the last three weeks, officials from BCSEA were working on the report for both class 10 and 12 results, analysing the marks of thousands of students and hundreds of schools.  The report will be finalised in May.

The results, said BCSEA officials, also show the strengths of schools in respective subjects.

Based on the highest average scores subject wise, Yangchenphug high school’s strength is English; while for Jigme Sherubling high school in Trashigang, it’s geography, history and biology.

Mongar high school’s strength is in Dzongkha and computer studies, Chukha high school’s is in Dzongkha Rigzhung, and Gaselo high school, Wangdue, it’s economics.

Sarpang high school’s strength is in commerce, while the only private school in the list, Ugyen Academy in Punakha is in chemistry.  Drugyel high school’s strength is in mathematics and physics.

“The strength of schools in each subject shows the quality of faculty in the schools,” the report states, which would vary every year, depending on the set of teachers and students.

What the report also highlights is the performance of students, based on their parents’ occupational background.

It found that children of parents working in non-governmental organisations seem to perform better in English, economics, commerce, accountancy, computer studies and business mathematics than the children of other occupational groups.

Children of civil servants perform better in mathematics and sciences than others, while children of private employees did better in history.  Children of farmers did better in Dzongkha, Rigzhung and geography, while children of business people performed better in English literature.

BCSEA also uses a software to analyse the question papers, to find out the difficulty level of the questions.

For economics, the subject, which saw the worst performance, the report found that the question paper was “moderate,” because it had two easy questions, 25 moderate  and six difficult questions.

The difficult items were mostly from objective type questions, the report found, and markers said that students normally do not perform well on those questions that involve some calculations.

“According to some markers, most of the economics items were of higher level, and this has resulted in poorer performance for some years now,” the report stated.

Apart from the change in ability rating, business mathematics becoming more difficult over the years, and making students spend more time now on economics, have improved the performance in economics this year.

The chemistry paper, with 21 difficult questions, five easy and 38 moderate questions, was found challenging for the students.

But what the report has failed to highlight are the schools that are in the “bottom ten”, in terms of its performance or the subjects they are weak in.

By Sonam Pelden

source: http://www.Kuenselonline.com / Tuesday, March 27th, 2012