LAHORE: A large number of O/A levels students held a demonstration outside the Lahore Press Club on Thursday for cancellation of the Cambridge Assessment International Education (CAIE) October/November 2020 examination sessions, demanding an award of predicted grades.

The students were chanting slogans to press for acceptance of their demands. They were of the view that they were not prepared for the exams due to six months closure of their educational institutions due to the coronavirus.

Shahzada Ruhaan Ahmed, a student of the Lahore’s Saint Anthony’s School, said that due to Covid-9 pandemic all the schools and coaching centres were closed and the students could not prepare for the exams. He said the schools had started the online teaching system but it did not help them prepare for the exams. He suggested that they should be given expected grades based on their previous year’s assignment and results.

The private students demanded implementation of the policy used in the UK and Scotland and a change in the syllabus. They said they were going through huge mental stress during the past few months and many of them had lost their loved ones during the pandemic.

Their parents said they were worried about the safety of their children at the educational institutions as there a possibility that resurgence of the coronavirus cases during a second wave being predicted by the world health experts. They said the future of their children was at stake because they were not given time for any preparation of the examinations and it would further ruin the mental health of their children. They urged the regulatory authority Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulation (Ofqual) of the UK to cancel October CIE session and demanded predicted grades for both regular and private candidates on the basis of the coursework or any evidence-based assessment from Cambridge.

An online petition signed by more than 10,000 students states: “Cambridge has given us [the Pakistani government] a deadline (Sept 30) and an option to withdraw from Oct/Nov series and we want our schools to avail it.”

This means the students will have to sit exams in May/June 2021.

“However, we’d like our government to request Cambridge to give candidates of Oct/Nov expected grades just like they were given to other students. Our future depends on these grades and we don’t want to risk something that’d literally pave the way ahead of us,” the petition concludes.

Published in Dawn, September 18th, 2020