School principals and headmasters in Madang Province have raised their concerns to the provincial examination coordinator, Alphonse Igag last Friday after the conclusion of grade 10’s examination on the lack of funding for the marking of grade 8’s and 10’s examination paper and grade 9 and 11 selection.
According to the provincial examination coordinator, Alphonse Igag, he said that the general concerns raised was that they may not be able to complete this two process.
Mr Igag stressed that the advice they have been getting from the provincial administration is not helping at this time.
” We are calling on the provincial administration and responsible authorities to step in and address this issue thus we do not want our students to be held back in their education,” Igag said.
Igag revealed that the situation is not new to Madang as his school has been going out on its own in previous years to assist other schools in the province.
“For some years now my school ( Tusbab Secondary school) was able to assist in this sort of activities with funding to help out however, this year we are not able to fund this activities due to limitation of funds,” he said.
Meanwhile Education Minister, Jimmy Uguro whilst responding to the matter revealed that the provincial government is responsible as this funding are budgeted under the provincial education sectors in all provinces. “
“Such are administrative issues and it must be managed by the provinces,” Uguro said.
Minister Uguro reiterated that Education Department is responsible for examination papers preparations and distributions to the provinces, thus calls on respective authorities to assist the schools respectively.
Furthermore, several attempts were made to get the response from the Madang Provincial Administration were unsuccessful.