Thousands of excited primary schoolchildren, under close supervision of anxious parents, head to classrooms across the island this morning to sit the annual Barbados Secondary Schools’ Entrance Examination (BSSEE), also known as the Common Entrance Exam.
And yesterday it was preparation time for the 1 795 boys and 2 166 girls in anticipation of the exams to be conducted at the 22 secondary schools across the island.
Over at St Cyprian’s Boys’ School, principal and mathematics teacher Dave Layne said that “the bookwork” had been shut off from last Friday afternoon and yesterday was for the teachers to give last-minute pointers.
Twenty-seven boys from the school are scheduled to take the examination today, and Layne said they were confident.
Schools also appealed for divine guidance as they prepared for today. Students from Belmont Primary, George Lamming Primary, Hill Top Preparatory and St Giles Primary, accompanied by their principals and teachers, attended a service at Carrington Wesleyan Holiness Church as part of Child Month.
Reverend Clayton Springer held an interactive session with the children, and gave them advice for the examination. He told them not to be overanxious since the work would be based on what they had studied in school over a period of time.
At Eden Lodge Primary, 105 students expected to take the exam were going through corrections for a paper before lunch, after which they were expected to relax.
One of the Class 4 teachers, Linda Jones, said that the students were given the opportunity to ask any questions and go through any areas they were unsure of.
It was a case of “Don’t worry about a thing. ’Cause every little thing is gonna be all right!” at Sharon Primary School.
The students there took Bob Marley’s song Three Little Birds as an inspiration to see them through today.
Sixty-nine Class 4 students of Sharon Primary School came together with staff and parents yesterday morning at the nearby Sharon Moravian Church to give God thanks for the school’s rich history and to ask Him to grant that institution more blessings in the years to come.
In a short devotional, Reverend Ezra Parris told the students that worrying could not help any situation, and although today was an important day in their lives they should not be overly worried. (TTY/LK/DH)
