Grade 10 students at Kopkop College in NCD started this week’s National Exam with their Math and Personal Development papers yesterday, joining more than 70,000 Grade 10s throughout PNG.
Deputy Principal, Rogana Pawai said Kopkop College is among 57 other registered private schools in NCD, gives them the opportunity to oversee the National Examination similarly to any other government-run schools in PNG.
The exam papers were handed by the Measurement Services Division to all school principals in NCD last week, while an external invigilator is now present at the school to monitor the exam.
Amid this challenging time, Ms Pawai advised all Grade 10s: “Do not enter an exam room with doubt but be confident in your thoughts knowing that you can and you will do it. When you allow doubt to creep in you are likely to deter your judgement.”
Kopkop College has performed well in previous examinations of which a good number of its students continue to be chosen under the top five category to attend national high schools.
“Again, this year we are very confident with our current Grade 10s and are expecting some good results from them.”
Following on from last years’ experience, Ms Pawai believes their teachers have certainly learnt lessons from COVID-19 and have settled into a new way of managing their time and coming up with creative ways to cover lessons.
“For us teachers it has been very challenging. The lockdown ripped us from our teaching time. We have never faced this before. When COVID came in we had to readjust and complete the exams in time.
“They have done well and there’s no topic that wasn’t covered. COVID made us realize that emergencies are bound to happen and moving forward we are prepared.”
The Department of Education has since notified all schools of the exam procedures and appealed for strict compliance. These include, strict administering of exam timing, penalty on cheating, malpractices must be reported and ban on all mobile phones.