Making UPSR less stressful
PUTRAJAYA: The media will no longer provide large-scale coverage of Ujian Pencapaian Sekolah Rendah (UPSR) proceedings, and examination results will no longer be announced via press conferences.
The move was announced today by the Examination Syndicate, which was seeking to end the perception of UPSR as a “high-stakes assessment”, which caused stress for pupils, parents and teachers.
It said UPSR was a “checkpoint tool” to assess pupils’ literacy, numeracy and reasoning at the primary school level.
“The core focus of UPSR is to assess Year Six pupils’ minimum proficiency after undergoing six years of primary school education. It is not a certificate examination. We want to ease the pressure (on pupils, parents and teachers),” the Examination Syndicate said yesterday.
It said large-scale media coverage could hinder the Education Ministry’s intention, thus the media has been asked to simply relay information on UPSR objectives and key dates.
“This includes (helping the public understand) the examination system,” it added.
With this in view, the media was not allowed access to schools in the administrative capital here on the first day of this year’s UPSR.
A total of 440,743 pupils have registered to sit this year’s UPSR at 8,100 examination centres from Sept 20 to 27. The ministry said 430,031 of the candidates were from public schools and 10,712 from private schools.