Arakan State matriculation exam centres to be concentrated in towns

By DMG 29 Dec 2022

DMG Newsroom
29 December 2022, Sittwe

The Arakan State Education Department will run matriculation exam centres primarily in towns because few matriculation students are taking the exam, according to the head of the Myanmar Examinations Department, who recently informed district and township education officers of the plan.

“There will be fewer exam centres compared to last year,” said Arakan State education department head U Ba Htwee Sein. “They will mainly be run in towns. We can’t run an exam centre if only 10 students are doing the exam there. Last year, exam centres were run in towns due to security concerns. But this year, exam centres will be run in towns because of the small numbers of students.”

More than 19,000 students have registered to sit the matriculation exam in Arakan State in March of next year. The list of exam centres will be announced in the last week of January.

Because exam centres were run largely in towns last year, some students from rural villages who could not afford travel and accommodation costs could not take the exam.

“There were clashes and we were displaced this year,” said U Kyaw Aye Tin, a father and farmer from Ponnagyun’s Kywehtoe Village. “We could not harvest paddy in time, and have suffered loss. Prices have increased a lot, and costs will be higher than last year. I am anxious that I may not be able to afford to pay the costs for my son to take the exam.”

“If not all of them pass the March exam, perhaps they will be given one more chance to sit the exam according to the old curriculum,” said U Ba Htwee Sein.

As the regime has introduced a new curriculum, Grade 11 students will only have to take the end-of-year exam organised by their schools, but not the government-organised exam. They will be given certificates of completion of basic education if they pass the Grade 12 exam organised by their schools in 2024.

According to the Arakan State Education Department, 41,747 students sat the matriculation exam in the academic year 2021-22, and 19,729 passed the exam.