Latest update March 29th, 2024 12:59 AM
Feb 17, 2017 News
With a cloud of suspicion hanging over the Guyana Nursing Council, the Ministry of Public Health is currently considering bringing on board the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) to prepare Professional Nurses State Final
Examinations in the future.
This disclosure was made on Wednesday by Minister within the Ministry of Public Health, Dr. Karen Cummings, during an interview with this publication.
In much the same way as the Ministry of Education has been relying on CXC to improve its Mathematics performance at the National Grade Six Assessment level, Minister Cummings said, “That is the route we want to go for the nurses exams.”
This development comes on the heels of an ongoing investigation to identify those who are culpable for leaking the 2016 State Final Examination which was conducted in October of last year.
It is believed that person or persons within the Council – which has long had the mandate to prepare examinations for the country’s nursing schools – were involved in leaking the examination. This state of affairs is currently engaging the attention of the Guyana Police Force.
In fact an investigation into the matter had caused the nursing students to be in limbo since the completion of the examination. But last week Senior Minister of Public Health, Ms. Volda Lawrence, announced that student nurses who participated in the 2016 State final will on February 21, 2017 be required to re-sit Paper One of the examination.
She had revealed that the paper one or multiple choice segment of the examination was leaked. In light of the situation and the concerns that officials within the Nursing Council could be involved, a decision was made for the Ministry of Education to instead prepare the substitute examination.
In essence, “The Ministry of Education will act on behalf the Ministry of Public Health to engage its personnel to prepare multiple choice questions; to administer those questions [and] to have a group of persons recruited to mark the essay part of those questions,” Minister Lawrence disclosed.
She, however noted that the Nursing Council will be required to provide tutoring sessions for the nursing students since “not all of the students who wrote the 2016 examination were able to complete both parts, so it will only be those students who have written the multiple choice aspect of the examinations…”
According to the Minister, based on the numbers from the Nursing Council, approximately 150 students will be required to re-sit the examination. It is expected that the results of the examination will be presented to the Public Health Ministry and the declaration of the results will be done no later than March 2, 2017.
But according to Minister Cummings, while the Public Health Ministry has relied on the Education Ministry to set this examination, a permanent alternative is being considered.
“Because of what has happened we have no confidence in the Nursing Council, even the students don’t have confidence in the Nursing Council. This is the first time that it is being exposed like this, but even before it seems that this has been going on,”Minister Cummings reflected.
This exposure, she disclosed, will understandably “Put the [student] nurses in a very uncomfortable situation; there are [student] nurses who would have studied, and it is unfair to them too that they have to re-sit. So we are working as a team…what we are doing is for all Guyanese. We want to make it better for both the students and the teachers,” the Public Health Minister asserted.
But in order to effectively address the situation, Minister Cummings stressed, “We are going to go the Caribbean way. We have to get a new curriculum and we will have to work on that new curriculum. We will need both the students and tutors to improve if we are to have that regional standard. They have to be au fait, so we have to train them so that we can roll out the curriculum,” she added.
THIS IDIOT TELLING GUYANA WE HAVE NO SAY IN THE 50% PROFIT SHARING AGREEMENT WE HAVE WITH EXXON.
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