The UPSR leak stained by greed
Ishmael Lim, FMT
When news of the second leak in the UPSR examinations came to light last Thursday evening, the public’s earlier sense of worry and disappointment must surely have turned into anger and disbelief.
The sitting for the Science exam was cancelled when it was found that the leaked paper was circulated over the social media “WhatsApp” but the discovery of the leak in the English paper came too late as the students had already taken that exam.
Now with the English paper and Science paper being compromised, the Ministry of Education has rescheduled the re-sitting of the English paper for September 30 when the Science paper is also to be taken.
Rescheduling the Science exam is one thing but what irks parents and students most is the wasted effort and time in preparing and sitting for the English exam only to find it voided. They now face the prospect of a tiresome and stressful re-do. Even the kids are complaining that the holidays are not beginning for them when they ought to on Friday, afraid that the one week absence from school will be just another grind.
This year there are approximately 473,000 students sitting for the UPSR, so one can easily imagine a scenario where nearly one million angry dads and mums are sharing their annoyance and disgust with their friends and families.
Any conscientious parent with a child doing UPSR would have been preparing their child all year long for this nationwide standardised assessment. It marks the completion of six years of compulsory primary education for the 12-year-old grouping in Malaysia.
It is common knowledge that competitive parents would enrol their children for lessons at tuition centres in addition to normal school in the hope of giving their kids an extra edge in standardised government examinations. Although leaks have occurred in the past they have mostly been confined to the senior levels like SPM. This the first confirmed incident involving the very junior UPSR level exams.
The Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) have been helping police track down the culprits responsible for the leak and Education Minister, Muhyiddin Yassin has suspended the Director and Deputy Director of the Malaysian Examinations Syndicate (LPM) in response to angry calls from parents for someone to be held accountable.
Former Senator and Johor DAP deputy chairman, S Ramakrishnan said that the education minister was always apologising for the leakages but the problem kept recurring, citing the leaked SPM papers from last year.
With the staggering number of students annually sitting for major government exams like STPM, SPM, PT3 and UPSR the niche business of tuition has become a booming industry as many parents believe their children are not getting quality from the teachers in the national school system.
