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Here’s the big picture of changes to the PSLE. Will parents

and students get it?
By JASON TAN ENG THYE

Raj Nadarajan/TODAY
Students receiving their PSLE results in 2017. The author says the revamp of the PSLE scoring system
could lead to concerns among some parents about increased competition for entry into the prestigious
secondary schools.

Published 31 JULY, 2019

UPDATED 03 AUGUST, 2019

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On July 25, the Ministry of Education (MOE) announced details of the revised
Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE) scoring system.
A key feature of the new scoring system is that students will be graded based on
their individual performance in the subjects, regardless of how their peers have
done. Students will get an Achievement Level (AL) score — which runs from
AL1, the best score, to AL8 — in place of the old T-score.

This will make it easier for parents and students to understand how the PSLE
score is calculated, as well as how the scores of Standard-level subjects compare
with those of Foundation-level subjects meant for students who are academically
weaker.

Another change is the introduction of choice order of schools as a tie-breaking

criterion to allocate students to secondary schools.

How are these revisions to the PSLE scoring system to be understood from a
policy point of view? And how will students and parents react?

First, the revisions are the latest in a series of incremental policy reforms
instituted over the past two decades, which MOE hopes will work in tandem
towards the overall goal of better preparing students for the future.

Read also: PSLE changes: Parents say they will be more careful
when choosing secondary schools

These reforms have had several main thrusts.

The first is the proliferation of multiple education pathways. These include the
integrated programmes in secondary schools and junior colleges, specialised
independent schools, and specialised schools for students in the Normal
(Technical) stream.
Another is the improved porosity of movement across various pathways. For
instance, it is now easier for Normal (Academic) stream students to sit for the
General Certificate of Education (GCE) Ordinary Level examinations at the end
of four years of secondary school and to enrol in polytechnics.

Read also: PSLE changes no silver bullet, but part of ‘significant

reform’ to de-emphasise grades: Ong

Third, changes have been made to the ways in which students are sorted. The
practice of streaming students, which has been consistently decried as being
overly rigid, has been replaced with subject-based banding in primary schools
since 2008, with a similar move to be fully introduced in secondary schools by
2024.

Next, admission systems have been reformed. The introduction of the Direct
School Admission system in secondary schools, junior colleges and polytechnics
is a prime example of how non-academic talents are accorded recognition during
admission exercises.

In recognition of the tremendous role that assessment practices play in driving

parents’, students’ and teachers’ attitudes and behaviour, MOE has also
introduced several reforms in this respect.

Read also: Web app helps parents, students narrow down school
choices

Major reforms include the reduction of tests and examinations in both primary
and secondary schools in order to reduce assessment-related anxiety and
promote the joy of learning. There is also the announcement earlier this year
that the GCE N- and O- Level exams will be merged into a new common national
examination in 2027.
The new PSLE scoring system is supposed to fit seamlessly into the existing
framework of reforms in view of its powerful role as an assessment tool that
sorts students into various secondary pathways.

It has direct implications for parents and students in a few respects.

One of these is the need for them to consider the choice of Standard- or
Foundation-level subjects.

This will not be a major consideration for the vast majority, given the fact that
only about 10 per cent of the relevant age cohort studies one or more subjects at
the Foundation level.

Those students who are currently doing poorly in all four PSLE subjects will
likely opt to take all four of the subjects at the Foundation level. Therefore, it is
mainly students who are performing marginally who will need to decide between
Standard and Foundation levels.

It will not always be an easy task for them and their parents to balance
competing considerations.

On the one hand, they have to think about which level of curricular and
assessment difficulty will better suit them. On the other, there are also direct
consequences of their choice in terms of access to the various secondary-level
streams.

There is also the question of whether students have the potential to improve
their motivation level and academic performance, particularly in Primary 5 and
6.

Take for example a student who has been faring poorly in one or more subjects
from Pri 1 to 4. Will he or she be motivated to try to take his or her weaker
subjects at the Standard level in Pri 5 and 6 with the hope of getting a better AL
score to broaden his range of secondary school choices?
And what happens if he or she decides to do so but later finds the Standard-level
subjects too daunting? Schools and teachers will have to work closely with
parents and students in making these crucial decisions.

Furthermore, can students cope with the possible stigmatisation that is still
associated with Foundation-level subjects?

What will have more important implications is the introduction of choice order
as a tie-breaking criterion during the secondary school admission exercise.

Because students will no longer be assessed based on how their peers perform, it
is likely that more students will have the same PSLE score. This means
secondary schools will be less differentiated by their admission cut-off points.

MOE therefore hopes that parents and students will pay more consideration to
factors other than schools’ cut-off points, such as school culture and co-
curricular activity offerings, when selecting schools.

Yet this sort of strategic decision-making requires parents and students to

engage in objective fact-finding in order to have a broad understanding of the
various schools, and then decide their priorities before arriving at an informed
decision.

The unfortunate reality is that not all parents are equally well-prepared and
equipped to make this important decision during an important crossroads of
their children’s schooling.

Primary school teachers will have to work closely with these parents and
students in order to help them make sense of the secondary school landscape
and understand the consequences of their choices.
At the same time, the clustering of PSLE scores could lead to concerns among
some parents about increased competition for entry into the prestigious
secondary schools.

Will these parents turn to more tuition, or try to find other ways to gain an
advantage for their children, thus defeating MOE’s policy intention?

In summary, the revised PSLE scoring system can be viewed as yet another
incremental reform within the overall slew of policy changes on various fronts.

It is supposed to fit in alongside concurrent moves to improve porosity of

movement across education pathways, while reducing stress levels associated
with the large range of PSLE scores and the norm-referenced grading system in
the current PSLE.

The associated changes to the secondary school system are also meant to nudge
parents further in the direction of making informed decisions involving a range
of factors other than academic cut-off scores when it comes to choosing a
secondary school.

Yet, as an instrument of change, it will likely encounter considerable resistance

from parents and students who are still familiar with the status quo, in which
academic results remain paramount and the private tutoring industry shows
little sign of diminishing in its importance.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Jason Tan Eng Thye is an associate professor of policy and leadership studies at
the National Institute of Education.
Topics
PSLE schools education MOE

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