News | Sunday, 28 June 2009

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Private schools outperform state schools in O’levels

James Debono
It has been a bad year for students from State secondary schools who sat for their May 2008 O’levels, who were outperformed by their peers in the Junior Lyceums, Church and private schools.
Area secondaries are attended by students who do not pass 11+ exams for admission into the Junior Lyceum.
Just 13 students from the area secondaries sat for Paper A in the Maltese O’level, the paper in which students can receive the highest of grades – grade 1. Ten students failed the exam.
The absolute majority opted for the easier Paper B, in which students cannot aim higher than a grade 4, just over the grade 5 pass mark required for entry into the Junior College sixth form.
Students from private schools had a 16% failure rate in Maltese O’level (A), but only 1.2% failed their English O’level. Significantly, Junior Lyceum students outperformed independent school students when it comes to Maltese.
Church school students have emerged as the best all-rounders when it comes to maths, Maltese and physics.
The least popular subject – Arabic – was taken by just 3 11 students.
History too was not a popular subject. Only 262 students sat for the exam, less than the number of students who sat for home economics (764), physical education (443), religion (4,573) and social studies (2,075).
A total of 1,257 sat for the computers studies exam. Only 34% of those sitting for this exam attended state schools.

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