UNEB to Release First Results Under New Lower Secondary Curriculum

The Uganda National Examinations Board (UNEB) is set to release the Uganda Certificate of Education (UCE) results today, marking the first cohort to be assessed under the new lower secondary curriculum. This group of candidates has endured a challenging academic journey since joining Senior One in 2020. Their education began amid confusion over the curriculum rollout, characterized by inadequate teaching and learning materials and unprepared teachers.

Just months into their first term, the COVID-19 pandemic struck, leading to an unprecedented two-year school closure. When schools finally reopened, many institutions were still uncertain about how to implement the new curriculum. In some schools, the old curriculum remained in use until Senior Three, a situation confirmed by multiple independent studies and government reports. The Ministry of Education, through the Permanent Secretary, issued several circulars addressing these concerns.

Even after schools reopened, many teachers continued to struggle with delivering the competency-based curriculum. A recent report from the Auditor General indicated that the Ministry of Education has yet to fully equip all teachers with the necessary skills for teaching and assessing students under the new system. Despite these challenges, the four-year education cycle has come to an end, and learners sat their final examinations. The nation now eagerly awaits the results to gauge the success of the new curriculum's first implementation. Speaking to our reporter, Amos Ssebabakitta, a parent whose two children sat for their UCE exams under the new system, voiced concerns over disparities in curriculum implementation.

"With this new curriculum, learners in big schools had an advantage because their teachers were trained, but ours were taught by teachers who were also unsure of what was going on. We don’t expect much. Regardless of the results, there’s a big problem with this cohort—they are more or less like guinea pigs," he noted. On the other hand, Mark Kasirye, a candidate eagerly awaiting his results, was optimistic. He believes the examination items, as they were called, were not difficult and expects to pass with flying colors.

Unlike previous years, this year’s final UCE results will be determined by two components: 80% from the final examination and 20% from continuous assessments conducted at the school level. UNEB Executive Director Dan Odongo noted last year that, according to curriculum guidelines, no student can be graded or awarded a certificate unless their continuous assessment scores were submitted. Additionally, UNEB will present separate scores for student projects on the UCE certificates. "Scores for projects will be reported separately on the certificates. UNEB will not grade any candidate without a project score," Odongo stated. 

Parents will also notice a shift in the grading system, moving away from the traditional distinctions and credits. UNEB has introduced an alphabetical grading system for O-Level exams, using grades A, B, C, D, E, O, and F—where A represents the highest achievement and F the lowest. Candidates who missed the exams will be marked with an X. Furthermore, UNEB will report on learners' competency proficiency levels, providing insights into what a student who scores an A or B is expected to have achieved in terms of skills and knowledge.

Meanwhile, this examination session also included a group of learners sitting for what has been termed a "transition examination." These are students who were studying under the old curriculum but did not sit for their exams in 2023. This group includes those who failed, those who mixed up their papers for various reasons, and those who opted to retake the exams.

Education Minister Janet Museveni has noted that this will be the last opportunity for such candidates to sit the UCE exams under the old curriculum. However, this raises critical questions: What happens to those who fail this "final attempt"? Will this mark the end of their formal academic journey? Records indicate that a total of 379,748 candidates registered for both the new and old curriculum examinations, conducted at 4,168 centers. 

Among them, 10,147 candidates were expected to sit for the transitional examination based on the old curriculum, while 369,601 were the pioneers of the new curriculum. Of the transitional registered candidates, 54.7% were female and 45.3% were male. For the new lower secondary curriculum, 50.8% of the registered candidates were female and 49.2% male. Additionally, 138,502 candidates (36.4%) were funded by the government under the Universal Secondary Education (USE) Programme, an increase from last year's 114,200 government-sponsored candidates. The number of privately sponsored registered candidates stood at 241,246. Among the registered candidates, 825 learners were Special Needs Education (SNE) candidates.