Improvement in Grade-Four Literacy and Numeracy

Chairman of the Education Transformation Oversight Committee (ETOC), Dr. Adrian Stokes, has welcomed the improved performance in literacy and numeracy at the grade-four level.

In the recently concluded assessment for grade four, 99 per cent of students demonstrated satisfactory performance in literacy while 70 per cent of students showed mastery in numeracy.

“This compares well to the 2024 data, when the non-mastery rates for literacy and numeracy were 3.4 per cent and 6.1 per cent, respectively,” he said.

Dr. Stokes was addressing the presentation of the Year Three, Second Quarter Progress Report on the Transforming Education for National Development (TREND) programme at the University of the West Indies (UWI) Regional Headquarters in Kingston on Thursday (October 16).

He said that 67 per cent of students assessed this year have full mastery in reading, comprehension and writing, which compares favourably to the 65 per cent recorded last year in the same area.

“The growth is noted, and we encourage the stakeholders to sustain this momentum we are seeing,” he added.

Meanwhile, Dr. Stokes commended the measures being taken by the Ministry of Education, Skills, Youth and Information to drive performance in mathematics and English in the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC)

He noted that last year, the Ministry adopted a risk-based/tactical approach to focus resources and attention on schools that are struggling due to extenuating factors.

“They took a holistic approach where social factors like breakfast and lunch were taken into consideration as part of factors that needed urgent attention… we met with principals, boards, teachers, students, regional officers, really to get a better understanding of the challenges and to gauge the commitment of the key stakeholders to fix these issues,” the ETOC Chairman said.

He said that the goal was to move the national pass rate average for mathematics from 40 per cent in 2024 to 50 per cent, and from 77 per cent to over 80 per cent for English.

“I am very happy that the big push by all the stakeholders resulted in a five-percentage points movement… in mathematics to a national pass rate of 46 per cent. That is very, very commendable, and an eight percentage points movement in English language to a national average of 84 per cent. While the goal of 50 per cent was not achieved for mathematics, what is commendable to me is a significant improvement in the national average,” he stated.