Are we fairly measuring Jamaica’s high schools?

Every year, when Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) and Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE) results are released, Jamaicans eagerly examine the performance of high schools. Newspapers publish rankings, social media celebrates institutions with impressive pass rates, and parents naturally ask which schools are the “best”.

Academic performance matters. Schools must be accountable for the quality of education they provide; however, using examination results as the primary measure of a school’s effectiveness can create a misleading picture when we do not consider which students a school receives, how those students are placed, and who ultimately sits the examinations.

The issue is not whether CSEC and CAPE results should matter. They should. The issue is whether they tell us enough to judge the work of a school fairly.