Exam looms too large for some students to face Up to 2,400 students - or four of every 100 Secondary Six students - are set to miss this years Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education Examination. Yet the figure will be much less than last year, when 9,579 students did not take the exam. The Examination and Assessment Authority said 79,615 candidates - 66,613 from schools and 13,002 private - will sit for the diploma this year, down 3.3 percent on 2013. The number of school candidates is said to be 6.5 percent less than last year while there is a rise of 16.8 percent in private candidates. But based on the Education Bureaus New Senior Secondary Subject Information Survey in 2012-13, there were 69,111 Secondary Five students. Given that all were promoted to Secondary Six for 2013-14, this means 2,498 school candidates - 3.7 percent - have not applied to sit for the diploma. On what they are prepared to face in the exam, the authority found that four core subjects plus two electives remain the preferred combination, with 67.5 percent of candidates choosing this format. And the drop-out rate is high in some subjects. A total of 7,437 Secondary Five students took the compulsory part plus module 1 in mathematics, but only 4,656 have applied to sit for the exam - a 37.3 percent drop-out rate. The drop-out rate for combined science is 20.9 percent with only 4,107 candidates, while for business, accounting and financial studies it is 16.9 percent. Education-sector legislator Ip Kin-yuen said the difficulty of the exam caused most drop-outs. Since the Hong Kong Certificate of Education Examination has been canceled, all senior secondary students must face the HKDSE, he said. Because of the difficulties for some, he added, there should be career-oriented courses for those not aiming for university. Hong Kong Education Policy Concern Organization chairman Mervyn Cheung Man-ping said though the exam is in its third year some candidates may not have grasped fully what is required. But some exam drop-outs may be looking to overseas, he added.
Posted on: Wed, 29 Jan 2014 09:09:59 +0000
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