Education Ministry considers scrapping NGSA – Manickchand

– assures that education in Guyana would not be static

Minister Priya Manickchand has announced that the Education Ministry is actively exploring the possibility of scrapping the National Grade Six Assessment (NGSA) examinations, thereby marking a potentially historic shift in how students transition from primary to secondary education in Guyana.
Speaking at the launch of the National STEM Fair on Wednesday, Minister Manickchand said Guyana’s education system is entering a transformative period in which traditional modules must evolve to better meet the needs of today’s learners and the demands of a modern, rapidly developing society.
“We are looking at various new things that we could do. With universal secondary education, do we still need a placement exam? Because that’s what NGSA is, a placement exam. Do we need a placement exam, or can we transition to secondary schools because we now have enough in your community? To do that, it would mean every secondary school has to offer equally and equitably the same kind and quality of education,” the Minister said.
The Minister emphasized that in order to phase out the NGSA as a placement mechanism, the Government must ensure that every secondary school offers equitable and high-quality education across all regions. This, she noted, is already in motion through massive investments in school infrastructure, teacher training, curriculum expansion, and digital access.
Additionally, Manickchand made it clear that eliminating the exam does not mean eliminating competition. If parents and students still desire access to high-demand schools, options can be designed for competitive entry. However, the broader goal is to remove high-stakes pressure from children at age 11, and make education more inclusive and developmentally appropriate.
“That doesn’t mean that we’re taking away from competition. If you want to gain one of a particular number of schools, we can set an exam for those who are competing for those schools. But those are new things we have to start looking at. Do we need to continue to offer at CSEC subjects only in fifth form? Can children who want to do it earlier go ahead and do it earlier? We’ve been seeing more of that,” she highlighted.
Minister Manickchand warned that reform would come with resistance, particularly from those clinging to outdated modules. In this regard, she called on all stakeholders: teachers, students, parents, and administrators, to embrace change and prepare themselves to adapt to the evolving education landscape.
“We have challenges, some of which would be that the system is so stuck on itself that to bring about any change requires, or is viewed with, suspicion, fear, sometimes ignorance many times, and just a refusal to evolve with the times. We commit to you from the Government that none of that will stop us from doing what the children of Guyana need today…,” she explained.
“It’s a different time, and it’s going to require different input to get a different output; and different output must be a better, more relevant person leaving the secondary school, (one) that is able to meet the needs of Guyana even as they meet the needs of their families,” she added.
Over the weekend, Minister Manickchand had announced that the results of the 2025 National Grade Six Assessment (NGSA) exams are expected to be released on or before June 26, 2025.
At NGSA, primary school pupils are tested in four subject areas; namely: Mathematics, English, Science and Social Studies. The examination in each subject area consists of two papers. Paper One consists of multiple-choice items, while Paper Two consists of essay-type or open-ended items.
This year, more than 15,000 pupils across the country sat the NGSA. According to Education Minister Priya Manickchand, a total of 15,813 students were registered to write the two-day national examinations; and of that number, 15,497 showed up for the assessment.
Among those sitting the exams were 115 students with Special Education Needs (SEND); and notably, 91 students wrote the assessments in Spanish — a historic first introduced last year.