School Certificate: 3 Years Or 4?

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30899, 4 November 1965, Page 13

School Certificate: 3 Years Or 4?

“The School Certificate examination lies ahead. Perhaps it is not correct to say it lies ahead, rather, it is like a sword of Damocles which is poised over the heads of pupils (and parents) and under its ominous shadow both staff and pupils work,” says a leading article in “The Argus,” magazine of the Aranui High School. “Naturally enough, parents must ask the question: ‘Will my son, or daughter, pass this examination at the end of the year?’ Or, what is an equallyworrying question, ‘Should I allow my child to sit?’ “Too many parents, it is felt, push their children into sitting for this examination at the end of the third year at school. This is not the parents’ fault because many of them do not realise that the School Certificate course was originally planned to cover four years. At that time it was not intended to be a three-year course for the majority. “This misunderstanding arose when, soon after the School Certificate examination was introduced, some schools decided to push a small number of their top pupils through in three years. The schools argued that it was wrong to hold back very bright pupils for ’ another year. “This may be true but there was good advertising in being able to boast that a number of first-year fifth formers had passed. Even now, after so many years of School Certificate, schools are judged on their percentage of School Certificate passes and not on the education they are offering. “Unfortunately, this practice of allowing pupils to sit at the end of the third year at school has become universal and children are taking the examination when, for their own general good and for the sake of their true education, they should have been advised and guided to wait for another year.

"If your child takes four years over School Certificate,

please do not scold him or her and most certainly do not be ashamed about the failure. Rather be thankful that your child is average and remember that the great majority of us are just that. The failure in three years does not mean that your child’s intelligence is lamentably low. The examination was so planned originally that the average child would pass in four years.

“It is obvious at this time of the year that not only parents, but also children are becoming far too worried over the final School Certificate results and this is a bad thing for all concerned. All pupils in the fifth forms should be working as hard as they can preparing themselves, to the best of their innate abilities, for the final examination yet a failure to achieve the necessary 200 marks must not be looked upon as a signal of complete and irretrievable incompetence.

“All post-primary schools in New Zealand must be able to provide many examples of pupils who have taken four years over their School Certificate and have then gone on

to pass their University En trance Examination.

“Think carefully about which form your child is in and what position he or she holds in that group. Try to avoid that mistake which most —if not all—parents fall into so easily and so understandably; that of over estimating their child’s potential. If, unfortunately, a pass is not achieved in three years do not meet your child with a look of bitter disappointment for he will feel that not only has he failed but also he has let you down.

“One of New Zealand’s worst faults is keeping up with the Joneses and of acquiring, at exorbitant cost, certain status symbols, passing School Certificate in three years is becoming just that. Parents boast about it for months afterwards and seem to delight in hurling it into the faces of other parents whose children have not been quite so lucky. Obviously, the passing of this examination in three years has certain advantages, but do let us keep it in correct proportion.”