Ministry issues exam rules
THE Ministr y of Education, Youth and Sport announced guidelines on Wednesday for students to follow during t his year’s Grade 12 examinations. In the announcement posted on its Facebook page, the ministr y said candidates would be disqua lified if t hey failed to hand in answer sheets, mobile phones and other electronic dev ices to invigilators before the examinations or are found to have hidden materia ls during t he tests.
The announcement said candidates who cause disorder will automatica lly fail and are subject to being suspended from Grade 12 examinations for one or t wo years.
In serious cases, candidates will be referred to t he releva nt aut horities for f urt her action.
Ministr y spokesman Ros Soveacha told The Post on Thursday that a ll high schools throughout the Kingdom had a lready disseminated t he guidelines before the ministr y’s announcement.
“Now we publicise it on Facebook. On the examination days, the ministr y will post t he guidelines at a ll centres,” he said.
Article 49 of t he Education Law states that anyone found to ta ke nationa l exams for others faces a fine of up to five million riel ($1,250).
In t he case of a repeated of fence, t he fine will be doubled and the offender will be suspended from the examinations for t wo years or barred from registering for f uture ones.
Article 605 of t he Criminal Code stipulates that candidates caught paying bribes of any form face up to 10 years imprisonment.
Im Sot hy, t he executive director of NGO Youth Council of Cambodia, on Thursday described t he ministr y’s guidelines as too litt le too late.
“The ministr y issued the guidelines when it’s a lready close to t he examination days. It could confuse candidates and lead to them committing honest mista kes during the examinations,” he said.
Sot hy a lso ca lled on t he ministr y to correct technica l glitches in its scoring system, which last year sparked controversies and led to candidates protesting t he of ficia l results.
“If t he ministr y is not attentive, it could cause people to lose trust in t he education system,” he said.
A tota l of 119,217 students, 61,031 of t hem girls, have registered for t his year’s Grade 12 examinations, which will last t wo days on August 19-20. That represents an increase of 5,852 candidates compared to last year.
The number of examination centres t hroughout t he countr y for t his year increases by si x to 202. Candidates will ta ke only seven exams out of a tota l of 10 subjects t hey study at schools.
Noticeably absent from t his year’s Grade 12 exams will be the Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU), which had sent its obser vers to inspect the exams over the last five years.
The anti-graft body instead urged the education ministr y to strengthen the inspection of the examinations in its absence.