An Analysis of the Secondary School Certificate Examination: The Case of Creative Questions

The aim of this study was to investigate the construct validity of the English Language reading test of secondary school certificate examination in Bangladesh. A qualitative research method was incorporated to collect and analyze the data followed by a retrospective and introspective interview. For conducting the research, the eight SSC candidates of session 2021-2022 and three teaching and testing experts were invited. The students were asked to participate in an instant English reading test and the experts were invited to make judgments on three reading strategies and students’ reading performances. The study found a little agreement among specified reading strategies of secondary education curriculum, experts’ judgments and students’ used reading strategies for establishing the construct validity of the English reading test of secondary school certificate examination in Bangladesh.

Creative question is generally considered as a tool to measure students’ various levels of learning. The study focused on exploring the present situation of General Science test items/creative questions in Bangladesh. This descriptive study was conducted using a concurrent triangulation research design. To conduct this study both quantitative and qualitative data were collected. 16 test of General Science test items/creative question papers of 2015 or 2016 were selected purposively as sample from all educational boards. 48 students were selected conveniently for interview from those who had been passed the SSC examination of 2015 or 2016. For collecting data from these sources test analysis protocol and interview protocol were used as research tools. Test analysis protocol was consisted of two criteria; wording criteria and practicing criteria. Selected test items were analysed based on these two criteria and Bloom’s cognitive domain. The study revealed that major test items were developed in a way which direct students towards lower level learning. Few test items were focused to students understanding, application and higher order learning. In practice, students were engaged to only memorization and understanding through SSC examination assessment. Few test items were devoted to application level learning of students. Higher order learning was totally ignored in SSC examination questions.

Islanders’ educational choice: Determinants of the students’ performance in the Cambridge International Certificate Exams in the Republic of Maldives

The purpose of this study is to evaluate two methodological perspectives of test fairness using a national Secondary School Certificate (SSC) examinations. SSC is a suit of multi-subject national qualification tests at Grade 10 level in South Asian countries, such as Bangladesh, India, and Pakistan. Because it is a high-stakes test, the fairness of SSC tests is a major concern among public and educational policy planners. This study is a first attempt to investigate test fairness of the national SSC examination of Pakistan using two independent differential item functioning (DIF) and differential bundle functioning (DBF) procedures. The SSC was evaluated for possible gender bias using multiple-choice tests in three core subjects, namely, English, Mathematics, and Physics. The study was conducted in two phases using explanatory item response model (EIRM) and Simultaneous Item Bias Test (SIBTEST). In Phase 1, test items were studied for DIF, and items with severe DIF were flagged in each subject. In Phase 2, the item bundles were analyzed for DBF. Three items were detected with large DIF, one for each subject, and one item bundle was detected with a negligible DBF. Taken together, the results demonstrate that there is no major threat to the validity of the interpretation of examinees’ test scores on the SSC examination. The outcome from this study provided evidence for test fairness, which will enhance test development practices at the national examination authorities.

Recommender system (RS) is a knowledge discovery and decision-making system that has been extensively used in a myriad of applications to assist people in making distinct choices from vast sources. This paper proposes a recommendation system that will help the prospective students of Bangladesh in choosing the most suitable private universities for getting admission. Since selecting the best private university does not depend merely on a few criteria or choices and making a decision considering all those criteria is not an easy task, a recommendation system can be of great assistance in this scenario for the prospective students. In this proposed recommendation system a list of top-K private universities is recommended to the students who are willing to get admitted to the private universities using content-based filtering technique. To attain this goal we considered six parameters, namely grade point average (GPA) of secondary school certificate (SSC) examination, GPA of higher secondary certificate (HSC) examination, total GPA, tuition fees, university ratings, and university rankings. Finally, we evaluated the system with a total of 947 real feedback from prospective students and obtained the accuracies of 89.05%, 95.85%, 48%, 92.32%, and 71.93% using 5 different performance metrics: precision, recall, specificity, F1 score, and balanced accuracy, respectively.

This study examines the factors influencing the academic performance of undergraduate students at the University of Peshawar. By employing a stratified random sampling method with 530 students, and utilizing Multiple Linear Regression, the research identifies several key predictors of cumulative grade point average (CGPA). The findings reveal that higher marks in the Secondary School Certificate (SSC) examinations are strongly associated with a higher CGPA, underscoring the significance of prior academic achievement. Additionally, a positive correlation is observed between parental education levels and students' academic performance, suggesting that parents with higher education levels contribute to a more supportive educational environment. Active parental support is also a significant predictor of higher CGPA, emphasizing the crucial role of encouragement and assistance from home. Furthermore, students who exhibit greater attention in class tend to achieve higher CGPA, highlighting the importance of classroom engagement. Other notable factors include HSSC marks, father's income, financial support for accommodation, effort in solving tutorial questions, the presence of a study space, and daily study time. These insights offer valuable guidance for educators and policymakers in developing targeted strategies to enhance student support systems and improve academic outcomes.

Developing language skills is a must for being proficient in any language for successful communication which is one of the most sought-after soft skills in the world today. Given the poor English proficiency of Bangladeshi students, this study investigated the status of listening skills, one of the vital primary language skills, in classroom practices and testing systems at the secondary level in Bangladesh. In this mixed methods research, twelve teachers from different secondary level schools and seventy students from two schools in Jashore district, Bangladesh were surveyed with structured questionnaires. Moreover, semi-structured interview sessions were conducted with six teachers. Simultaneously, the contents of the textbook 'English for Today' (for Classes Nine and Ten), and the Secondary School Certificate (SSC) examination question papers were also analyzed. The overall findings of this study revealed that listening skills did not have adequate attention and necessary importance in the textbook contents, classroom teaching-learning processes, and testing systems. The existing teaching-learning practices have substantially failed to impart optimum English proficiency, especially listening skills to the students. Therefore, this research recommends the incorporation of listening skills into classroom activities and testing systems proportionately.

The current National Curriculum 2012 of Bangladesh recommends all four skills of English language education to be assessed in school and public exams. In the curriculum, there is a suggestion to evaluate the listening abilities of students through a formative assessment throughout the year at schools. The marks of the listening assessment need to be counted with the other three skills while grading students’ English language papers for the secondary level in the Secondary School Certificate (SSC) examination. However, the existing exam evaluates only reading and writing tasks. Although various attempts are underway to reform the current language assessment procedure by including listening and speaking skills, nothing has come out in concreate so far. With this article, I provide expert insights into the challenges of listening assessment with the goal of helping policymakers and the secondary school teachers. In-depth interviews with policymakers and secondary school teachers and (n=16) are qualitatively analysed to gain reflection into the existing challenges to assess listening and how to make the assessment procedures. The findings and discussion of the article propose a conceptual framework that can be helpful for the teachers and policymakers to deal with the challenges.

This doctoral thesis describes the findings of a study which utilized a sociocultural perspective to explore the teaching expertise of three EFL tenth standard teachers employed in Marathi-medium government-sponsored schools in India. A synopsis of the literature on expertise is offered which spans several decades across several domains, including teaching. However, two distinct positions emerge from an analysis of the literature on teaching expertise, namely ‘expertise as a state’ and ‘expertise as a process’. Given the relevance of the Secondary School Certificate (SSC) examination as a life-changing examination for tenth standard students, this study underscores the need for research which focuses on EFL teaching expertise in India where EFL teachers prepare students for high-stakes examinations. This study aims to shed light on EFL teacher expertise and highlights how teaching expertise is context and culture bound, given the specific sociocultural context within which teachers operate.
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\nThe three participants in this research study are 10th standard EFL teachers who teach English as a third language in the secondary schools of the Pune community of Maharashtra, India. The qualitative research paradigm utilizes the tools of ethnography and case study methodology. The data sources include in-depth audio-recorded, semi-structured interviews with 10th standard teachers and video recordings of the teachers’ lessons. Audio-recorded, semi-structured interviews were also conducted with school principals, B.Ed. college teacher trainers, 10th standard students and their parents. Other artifacts collected for this study include 10th standard teachers’ lesson plans, teacher evaluation forms, syllabus, coursebook, general information survey results and researcher notes.
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\nA significant finding of the research is that tenth standard EFL teaching expertise evolves over time and supports Berliner’s notion of adaptive expertise (Berliner, 2001). Secondly, the results indicate that EFL teacher expertise is dependent on the formation of the key construct namely, deep pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) which is a requirement of teaching expertise (Killen, 2009; Shulman, 1987). Thirdly, the research data support a dialectical view of human learning and development. Thus, the teachers’ awareness of best teaching practices is modified through their interactions with their students, their communities of practice (Wenger, 1998) and the sociocultural context (Vygotsky, 1978) in which they live and work resulting in an ongoing transformation in the nature of their teaching practice and their professional identities as expert EFL teachers.

This article was migrated. The article was marked as recommended.This comparative cross-sectional study was conducted to find the association between duration of service in rural health facilities and physicians’ background factors to redress geographic imbalances in physician distribution. Among 6898 participants, information of 989 were retrieved from Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS), Minsitry of Health and Family Welfare (MOHFW), Bangladesh, through systematic sampling. Physicians who worked in rural health facilities for less than 3 years were labelled as group A, and those worked 3 years or more in rural places were put in group B. Background factors of two groups were compared and proportion of doctors living and working in rural areas was sorted. Among the participants, eighty percent were working in urban facilities and 50% worked in rural areas for less than three years. Proportion of females was about 30% and there was no significant differences between male and female in terms of duration of stay in rural areas in both groups (p=0.07). The association between place of completion of secondary school certificate (SSC) examination and duration of services in the rural areas were found statistically significant (p=0.003). Apart from this, no other background factors were found to be significantly associated.

Background: Education is one of the most essential factors in producing a human resource & the academic performance becomes important since it is commonly used as a reflection of education. To find out the relationship between past and present academic performance among medical students of Bangladesh. Methodology: This cross-sectional study was conducted to assess the relationship between past and present academic performances of the medical students of Bangladesh. A total of 436 student respondents participated in this study from eight purposively selected of Bangladesh those are located at Dhaka and outside Dhaka) from January to December 2022 using a pretested semi-structured self-administered questionnaire. Results: This study find that out of 436 medical students’ majority i. e. 416 (95.4%) students got GPA score 5 and very few i.e. 20 (4.5%) got GPA score <5 in the Secondary School Certificate examination. In Higher School Certificate examination majority i.e. 386 (88.5%) students got GPA score 5 and 50 (11.5%) students got GPA score <5. This study also find that out of 130 responses about the result of first MBBS Professional examination, most of them (92.3%) passed regularly and 7.6% passed irregularly. Out of 83 responses about the result of second MBBS Professional examination, most of them (96.3%) passed regularly and 3.6% passed irregularly. Out of 30 responses about the result of third MBBS Professional examination 100% passed regularly and no irregularly passed was found. In the fourth MBBS Professional examination 50% passed regularly. There was an inverse relationship between the combined scores of Secondary School Certificate examination and Higher School Certificate examination with the result of professional examinations. Conclusion: Academic performance at the secondary education or pre-university college level is generally considered the strongest indicator of academic merit in tertiary education. CME J 2024; 3(2); 16-19

Measurement of predictive validity of admission criteria used by public dental colleges in Pakistan. Time to reconsider

Gender differences in the manifestation of brain fag, depression and indices of anxiety among secondary school students in Nigeria

Health education (HED) as a subject in the secondary school curriculum has been made a compulsory subject in West African Examination Council (WAEC) and Senior Secondary School Certificate (SSCE) examinations for any candidate wanting to study any course in the medical and health-related disciplines in Nigerian tertiary institutions. This study seeks to find out the extent of the teaching of HED as a school subject in secondary schools in Bayelsa State; not as components of other subjects like health science, biology, and physical and health education. The proposed approach of the study was a State-wide survey of the teaching of HED as a school subject in secondary schools. This was done by involving 114 schools out of the 192 schools in the State. Findings revealed that out of the 114 schools visited, 38 schools only teach Physical and Health Education (PHE) as a subject in the Junior Secondary School level. During interviews with heads of schools that teaches PHE; it was gathered that the teachers who teach PHE also doubles as teachers of HED at the Senior Secondary (SSS) level. Implying that only 38 schools out of the 114 sampled schools teach (HED) as a school subject; this reveals an abysmal absence of the teaching of Health Education as a school subject in Senior Secondary Schools (SSS) in Bayelsa State, Nigeria. The none-teaching of HED underscores its importance to healthful-living It is therefore recommended that health education as a subject be encouraged and taught in all SSS in the State.

THE course of botany contained in these pages is claimed to cover completely the syllabus of the various School Certificate examinations. The authors also claim that the book is “suitable for the general reader who is interested in studying and experimenting with plants”. Few textbooks are of interest or use to the ‘general’ reader; and this definitely is a textbook. A two years' botanical course is developed along orthodox lines. The photographs are good and are genuinely illustrative of certain botanical facts. The line diagrams, however, leave much to be desired, and in a number of cases they are misleading. The subject matter is presented in an appropriate form, but in places, especially the experimental physiology, it tends to be rather out of date.