Displaced Yemeni students sit exams in Sanaa

National primary and secondary school exams have been taking place across Yemen amid the ongoing war, with a large number of displaced students sitting their exams in Sanaa, education officials tell Al-Mashareq.

This year, 612,267 students are registered to sit their exams at 5,112 exam centres in the Sanaa administrative district and most other provinces.

This includes 253,157 secondary school students and 359,079 students at the primary level.

On June 24th, 53,060 students in the south-eastern provinces sat their exams.

“The exams went smoothly in Aden and eight other provinces in the south-eastern part of Yemen, which is under government control," Deputy Minister of Education Abdullah Lamlas told Al-Mashareq.

The national exams, at both primary and secondary levels, took place July 30th in Sanaa and the northern provinces.

Sanaa accepts displaced students

The Sanaa administrative district has accepted the greatest number of students displaced from flashpoint areas including Taiz, Saada, Hadramaut, Aden and Abyan, Sanaa education office director general Mohammed al-Fadhli said.

This has resulted in a higher number of students registering for the national exams, he told Al-Mashareq, with a total of 80,000 students; 45,000 of whom are at the primary level and 35,000 at the secondary level.

The education office faced tremendous difficulties during the process “to cover the rising needs of newly registered displaced students in terms of books and other school requirements", al-Fadhli said.

It also was necessary to open new classroom space "due to shortages resulting from the use of schools in the capital as centres for sheltering displaced persons coming from other provinces”, he added.

The Sanaa district education office is working hard to provide students with the right environment for the exams and is now at full capacity, he said.

"This school year has been relatively better compared with last year, 2014-2015, as students managed to complete their curriculum and the educational environment has improved in spite of the ongoing war," al-Fadhli said.

“I did not manage to finish my secondary education last year in al-Daleh province due to the armed conflict there, which forced me and my family to move to Sanaa," displaced student Bassim al-Tahir told Al-Mashareq.

He has had to repeat the school year, he said, adding that he hopes he will pass this year's final exams.

No major hindrances to exams

The first week of the national exams for the primary and secondary levels was successful and without major hindrances, compared with last year’s exams, Deputy Minister of Education Abdul Kareem al-Jindari said.

The ministry "went to great lengths to provide a suitable environment for students to sit for their national exams so they can perform successfully", he told Al-Mashareq.

The main obstacle the Ministry of Education faces is a shortage in funds, he explained, as the process extends to collecting and grading the exams and announcing the results, all of which costs money.

Parents have been encouraged to help their children "complete the school year at the highest possible standards in spite of the war and the difficult economic conditions that the country is witnessing", al-Jindari said.

These include recurring power outages, he said, "which was a key grievance afflicting the population during the exam period”.

Community members have worked together to make the exam process a success, he added, while many parents helped their children study during the power outages by installing solar energy panels to provide lighting.

Undesirable behaviours such as cheating, crowding outside the centres or using heavy gunfire to disturb exam halls were not in evidence this year, he noted.

In some provinces, al-Jandari said, the ministry has sought to “enlist mosque preachers to raise awareness about the ills of cheating during the exams”.