Education standards improving in Hela and SHP, says Raitano

By YVONNE HAIP
SOUTHERN Highlands and Hela are gradually improving their education standard, says education administrator Joel Raitano.
He said after being one of the lowest ranked provinces, the students’ performance showed the results were better, describing it as “very encouraging.”
He said students did well in exams last year and there were increased enrolments, with the student-teacher ratio expected to be one teacher to 45 students.
The provincial education department wants to maintain the rate of improvement, Raitano said.
He said last year, Grade 8 exams results improved with 2,700 students being selected to Grade 9 out of the 4,000.
Raitano said the cut-off mark had also increased to 72 out of 150 after being 65 in 2010 and 70 in 2011.
Grade 10 students also performed well and Margarima High school in Hela has been upgraded into a secondary school to cater for the high number of students for Grades 9 and 11 this year.
He said Grade 12 students would have done well had they not been investigated for alleged cheating.
“The fault is with outsiders who did not uphold secrecy and the education department needs to investigate this.”
Raitano is pushing for these students to be certified and selected, based on their internal marks.