Cambridge International Examinations Research Articles

TRENDS IN STUDENT ENROLMENT AND PERFORMANCE IN GEOGRAPHY IN MAURITIUS 2012-2019

In this study, statistics from the Mauritius Examinations Syndicate (MES) were used to show trends in the Cambridge International Examinations (CIE) enrolment and performances in Geography for the period 2012 to 2019 at School Certificate level. All school candidates who sat for these examinations within the years under review constituted the target population for the study. Statistical data analysis was carried out using Microsoft Excel with its in-built trend line capabilities. Quantitative analysis showed an overall decline of 15.2% in the number of students opting for Geography at School Certificate level from 2012 to 2019. Findings also demonstrated that male candidates were more likely to achieve a pass mark than female candidates. A t-test analysis revealed a statistically significant difference between grades achieved by girls and boys at p < 0.05. Ultimately, a thorough analysis of chief examiners’ reports indicated that the recurring weak performances were often associated with rubric offences, and poor question comprehension.

Comparison of Physics Teacher’s Forecast Grade and Actual Grade Obtained by Candidates in Cambridge AS and A-Level International Examinations: A Case Study of an Advanced Level School in Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria

Aim: This paper examined a comparative assessment of teacher’s forecast and actual grades obtained by students who sat for Cambridge AS and A-Level International Examinations in an Advanced Level School, Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria for five (5) consecutive years. 
 Study Design: The teacher’s mark book which documented the forecasted grades for Physics in Cambridge AS and A-Level International Examinations from the year 2014 to 2018 was consulted and compared with the actual grades obtained by students over the same period. 
 Methodology: Two hundred and thirty-five (235) students’ results constitute the sampled population. Ahead of the time of final Cambridge International Examinations (CIE), some students who had withdrawn from the school system due to the fact that they are dead, terribly sick or gained admission into other higher institutions of learning and did not have their names on the CIE result broadsheets were disqualified from being part of the sampled population. This enabled the researchers to accurately compared the forecast grades of students who sat for CIE with the grades that they actually obtained. Shapiro-Wilk test of normality was carried out and the P-value was above 0.05 level of significance, as this shows that the data was parametric. SPSS version 23 was thereafter used to analyze the data and the hypothesis was tested using paired sample T-tests. 
 Results: There is no significant difference between Physics teacher’s forecast grades and the actual grades obtained by students in Cambridge Advanced AS and A-Level International Examinations for 5 years (2014 – 2018) as the teacher’s forecast grades for the last 7 examination series were accurate at P < 0.05 level of significance. The P –values; (0.083, 0.235, 0.260, 0.802, 0.328, 0.110 and 0.990) were above 0.05 significant level. 
 Conclusion: Findings from our study showed that there is no significant difference between Physics teacher’s forecast and the actual grades obtained by the students in the Cambridge Assessment International Education for October/November 2015, May/June 2016, October/November 2016, May/June 2017, October/November 2017, May/June 2018 as well as October/November 2018 examination series.

Challenges and Recommendations for Improving Chemistry Education and Teaching in the Republic of North Macedonia

The study aims to present the development of education in North Macedonia from the country’s independence to the present day, as documented in several national reports and other official documents. The focus is on development and changes in chemistry education throughout the years of primary, secondary and higher education. Particular attention is devoted to the introduction of the new curricula of natural sciences courses in primary education, which is an adapted curricula of the Cambridge International Examinations, and the use of information and communication technology in increasing the efficiency of the education system. Despite numerous reforms over the years, the country is still faced with various challenges and issues regarding chemistry teaching. Investment in education is constantly decreasing and no notable improvements in conditions for teaching chemistry are being made. Recommendations are made regarding the need for appropriately educated, qualified and motivated teaching staff, well-equipped laboratories and teaching resources, continuous professional development of teachers, mutual cooperation of all stakeholders in the educational process, and continuous support from the authorities and policy makers for gifted pupils and chemistry teachers at all levels.

Which preparatory curriculum for the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme is best? The challenge for international schools with regard to mathematics and science

There are two mainstream curricula for international school students at the junior high level: the International Baccalaureate (IB) Middle Years Programme (MYP) and the Cambridge International General Certificate of Secondary Education (IGCSE). The former was developed in the mid-1990s and is currently being relaunched in a 21st-century approach. The latter programme of study was developed by University of Cambridge International Examinations in 1985 and has become popular in recent years among British domestic and international schools worldwide due to the clarity of its learning content. The prevailing uncertainty about which curriculum is best to prepare students for the IB Diploma Programme represents a challenge for international schools. The purpose of the current study is to develop a methodology through causal models which can explain the relationship between student performance in the IGCSE and the Diploma Programme with regard to mathematics and science. The data evaluated here consisted of external examination scores of students who attended a private international high school between the years 2005 and 2012. Two structural equation models were developed. The first model employed a maximum likelihood estimation, while the second model used a Bayesian estimation with a Markov Chain Monte Carlo method. Both models fit the data well. The evidence suggests that the IGCSE provides a good foundational preparation for the Diploma Programme in mathematics and science.

Ideology, class and rationality: a critique of Cambridge International Examinations’ Thinking Skills curriculum

This article undertakes a critique of the aims and objectives of Thinking Skills, one of the most widely and internationally used curricula in the teaching of thinking, offered by the University of Cambridge International Examinations. By engaging in a critical discourse analysis of how political and class biases are (re-)produced in the forms of thinking that are valued in the classroom, issues of power and ideology latent in curricular discourses of rationality are foregrounded. Specifically, it will be demonstrated that the text engages in the ideological project of shaping our commonsense understandings of what thinking and rationality is and should be, not only in instrumental forms that both connect to neoliberal commitments and privilege a particular fraction of the middle class, but also in ways that evacuate substantive notions of morality, social justice, and the common good from individuals’ deliberations. The article concludes by pointing to alternative conceptualizations of thinking curricula.

New teaching model of colloid chemistry in AEO "Nazarbayev Intellectual Schools"

The article discusses a new integrated chemiсаl program developed by AEO «Nazarbayev Intellectual Schools» in cooperation with University of Cambridge International Examinations.

An eye on New Zealand

Some years ago, a fierce debate raged in New Zealand which pitched international examinations against its own national curriculum. Ann Puntis from University of Cambridge International Examinations explains more.

Beyond logic and argument analysis: Critical thinking, everyday problems and democratic deliberation in Cambridge International Examinations’ Thinking Skills curriculum

It is widely held that, by teaching individuals how to reason through and analyse everyday problems, the teaching of critical thinking develops the deliberative capacities essential to the healthy functioning of democracy. Implicit in this view is the assumption that a certain commensurability exists between the problems presented in such curricula and those that occupy democratic deliberation. In examining one influential critical thinking curriculum, University of Cambridge International Examination’s Thinking Skills, however, this article reveals the contingency of the assumption. With its presentation of problems steeped in discourses of logic and argument analysis, and with little consideration of notions of rightness/wrongness, such a curriculum can only tend towards the development of an instrumental form of rationality that, being morally indifferent and emotionally apathetic, contributes instead to the depoliticization of democracy. Given that the nature of democratic deliberation does not only focus on what is correct, but, more crucially, on what is right, it is argued that the problems on critical thinking curricula need to both engage individuals in deliberations over issues of social good, and allow them to think of themselves in ways that fundamentally tie them to other members of society.

Evaluasi Materi Ajar Bahasa Inggris Cambridge IGCSE dan A/AS Level Sebagai Materi Acuan Program SBI tingkat SMA di Indonesia, Studi Kasus SMAN 70 Jakarta

A law no 20/2000 paragraph 50, article 3 has been enacted by the Ministry of education concerning the implementation of International class in high Schools throughout Indonesia. The purpose of this regulation is to standardize the quality of the Indonesian students educational qualification to those of students abroad. As a result, Cambridge International Examinations IGCSE, A/AS Level have become popular to the majority of Indonesian High Schools, especially for subjects such as Mathematics, English, Physics, Biology and Chemistry. This research will look upon the develompment of school implementation of IGCSE, A/AS Level of English Language in SMA N 70 jakarta as a case study. Through several assessments of students IGCSE, A/AS Level tests, interviews, questionners and material evaluation, a reliable findings will be identified. At the end, ways of effective learning and teaching of IGCSE, A/AS Level for Indonesian High Schools will be suggested.

The predictability of enrolment and first‐year university results from secondary school performance: the New Zealand National Certificate of Educational Achievement

This study investigates the predictive correlations between results from the New Zealand National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA), a standards‐based qualification, and university grade point averages achieved by first‐year students in one large New Zealand University (and, for comparison purposes, also presents correlations from the Cambridge International Examinations [CIE], an international norm‐referenced system delivered in New Zealand, and university grade point averages achieved by first‐year students who entered with that qualification). The study then evaluates alternative models for university entrance, using different attributes of the qualifications for possible entry criteria, and ascertains the implications of the best of these models for different groups of students. The best alternative model gives greater weight to excellence and merit in NCEA results, and less weight to credit accumulation at minimum pass rates. A combination of this alternative model and the current model provides a merit‐based admissions system which would potentially increase the number of students from groups under‐represented in university education in New Zealand (students from Maori and Pacific ethnicities and from schools in lower socio‐economic communities), who are admitted with no necessary decline in the success rate during first‐year university study.