Sixty-six per cent of subject entries entered for the May/June 2016 Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) examinations achieved Grades I-III, the acceptable grades at CSEC. This is just two percentage points below that of 2015 when 68 per cent of entries achieved similar grades.

Performance improved on 14 subjects, declined on 17 subjects and remained constant on four subjects. Among the subjects which performed at 90 per cent or better this year are Physical Education and Sport with 98 per cent of entries achieving acceptable grades; Theatre Arts with 95 per cent, Agricultural Science (Double Award) with 92 per cent, Electronic Document Preparation and Management with 91 per cent and Principles of Business 90 per cent.

Mathematics and English
There were mixed results in Mathematics and English. For English A there was an improvement in performance with 67 per cent of entries achieving acceptable grades compared with 60 per cent in 2015. For English B, there was a 15-percentage point decline, 62 per cent of entries achieved acceptable grades this year compared with 77 in 2015.

There was a 13-point decline in performance in Mathematics with 44 per cent of entries achieving acceptable grades this year compared with 57 per cent in 2015. Performance also decline on Additional Mathematics: 67 per cent of entries achieved acceptable grades compared with 72 per cent last year.

Sciences
There were mixed performance in the science subjects this year. The biggest improvement was in Biology with a 14-point increase over last year. Eighty per cent of entries for Biology achieved Grades I-III compared with 66 per cent in 2015. Chemistry saw a three-per cent decline in performance this year when compared with 2015 with 56 per cent achieving acceptable grades this year compared with 59 per cent in 2015.

There was a seven-point decline in performance on Integrated Science this year when compared with that of 2015, sixty-four per cent of entries achieved acceptable grades this year compared with 71 per cent in 2015.

Performance on Physics improved marginally with 63 per cent of entries achieving Grades I-III this year compared with 61 per cent in 2015.
Both Agricultural Science Double Award and Agricultural Science Single Award recorded very good performance this year with slight improvement in the Single Award and slight decline in the Double Award. Ninety-two per cent of entries for Agricultural Science (Double Award) achieved acceptable grades this year compared with 94 per cent in 2015. Eighty-nine per cent of entries for Agricultural Science (Single Award) achieved acceptable grades this year compared with 87 per cent in 2015.

There was an eight-percentage point improvement in performance on Human and Social Biology this year, 53 per cent of entries achieved acceptable grades compared with 45 per cent in 2015.

Business
Ninety-one per cent of entries for Electronic Document Preparation and Management achieved acceptable grades, this is a one-percentage point improvement on performance in 2015 when 90 per cent of entries achieved the similar grades.

For Office Administration, 73 per cent of entries achieved acceptable grades this year compared with 86 per cent in 2015.

Performance on Principles of Accounts remained the same over the two years with 66 per cent of entries achieving Grades I-III. While performance on Principles of Business was excellent, it declined marginally when compared with that of 2015. This year 90 per cent of entries achieved acceptable grades compared with 93 per cent in 2015. Similarly, in Economics, 70 per cent of entries achieved acceptable grades this year compared 83 per cent in 2015.

Expressive Arts
Performance improved on two subjects, remained the same on one subject and declined on one subject in Expressive Arts cluster. Music saw a nine-point improvement in performance with 81 per cent of entries achieving acceptable grades this year, compared with 72 per cent in 2015. Performance also improved on Visual Arts this year with 66 per cent of entries achieving Grades I-III compared with 62 per cent last year. Performance remained steady on Performing Arts with an impressive 95 per cent of entries achieving acceptable grades in both 2015 and 2016. Physical Education and Sport recorded the best overall performance in CSEC this year with 98 per cent of entries achieving acceptable grades, however, this is one percentage point less than the 99 per cent that achieved similar grades in 2015.

TVET Subject
Performance improved on three subjects in the Technical and Vocational Education cluster – Food and Nutrition, Technical Drawing and Mechanical Engineering Technology. In Technical Drawing, 68 per cent of entries achieved acceptable grades this year compared with 63 per cent in 2015, while for Mechanical Engineering Technology 69 per cent achieved acceptable grades this year compared with 65 per cent last year. For Food and Nutrition 88 per cent of entries achieved acceptable grades this year compared with 85 per cent last year.

Performance on Home Economics Management declined this year when compared with 2015. Seventy-nine per cent of entries achieved acceptable grades this year compared with 86 per cent in 2015. For Clothing and Textiles 70 per cent achieved Grades I-III this year compared with 81 per cent in 2015.

Performance on both options for Building Technology declined this year. For Building Technology (Construction), 77 per cent of entries achieved acceptable grades this year compared with 82 per cent in 2015; while for Building Technology (Woods), 76 per cent of entries achieved acceptable grades this year compared with 79 per cent in 2015. For Electrical and Electronic Technology, 59 per cent of entries achieved acceptable grades this year compared with 62 per cent in 2015.

Numbers
The number of subject entries for the May/June 2016 sitting increased to 585,223 subject entries this year, up from 578,035 entries in 2015, however, the number of candidates declined marginally, from 132,824 candidates in 2015 to 132,674 candidates this year.

Mathematics continues to be largest CSEC subject with 92,529 subject entries submitted this year. It is followed closely by English A with 89,865 entries. Social Studies is the third largest with 46,867 entries; Principles of Business follows with 33,284 entries and Human and Social Biology with 29,308 entries rounds off the top five largest CSEC subjects.

 

For further information, please contact Cleveland Sam, Public Information Officer at (246) 227 1892 or via e-mail @ ClSam@cxc.org.