THE EDITOR, Sir:

I WRITE in response to the article published in your paper on March 19 titled 'Non-traditionals trump 'established' schools - Top 28 per cent of 'older' institutions'. This article is totally misleading and the Ministry of Education continues to pull a fast one on the general public.

The article claims that "Jonathan Grant, Old Harbour, Denbigh and Lewisville high schools had more than 70 per cent of their subject entries receiving passing grades". When one examines the data and looks at the success rates in maths and English language, it tells a different story (see table below). These are the only two compulsory subjects islandwide and are, therefore, best used to compare school performance at the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate level.

The success of a school cannot be measured by the pass rate of those who sat the exam; rather, it must be of the pass rate of the entire grade-11 cohort (total number of students in grade 11 and, therefore, eligible to sit the exam) as is used in the Task Force Report on Education Reform. In the case of English language, the pass rate varied from four per cent at Lewisville to 41 per cent at Denbigh, while for maths, it varied from three per cent to 17 per cent. Defining the pass rate based on the number of students who actually sat the exam is the ministry's way of falsely claiming it has achieved something.

It is time for the Ministry of Education to stop this nonsense and let us have the real information with which to make informed decisions.

I am, etc.,

ROBERT WYNTER

robwyn@cwjamaica.com