The original article requires translation.
The organizing authority Wallonia-Brussels Education (WBE) has decided; there will be no end-of-year exam session for official school students. From the first primary to the seventh secondary, the 127,000 students in the network organized by the French Community (about 15% of students) will be housed in the same boat. With two exceptions: the external tests (CEB, CED, CE1D) which are under the control of the Minister of Education, Caroline Désir (PS), will obviously take place. Just like the sixth secondary exams.
In the directive organizing the end of the school year that Le Soir was able to obtain, there is a whole series of measures which give "absolute priority to the reception of pupils and to learning". First of all, for elementary school students, in June the establishments will organize the compulsory CEB certification tests as well as a diagnostic evaluation in 2nd primary. And that's all. No assessment will be organized in the other years of study. The WBE network "asks" management to focus on essential learning as defined in the circular at the start of the year.
Priority to "diagnostic" tests
The same logic applies to secondary education. External certification evaluations (CE1D, CEB for non-titular students and CESS) will indeed take place. As the CESS is aimed only at French and history, the WBE network wanted to maintain the exams in Secondary 6. This session must however last for a maximum of seven half-days. “Apart from the certification or summative evaluations, everything must be done to continue teaching activities until Tuesday, June 22, 2021 at the earliest,” specifies the directive.
The organizing power WBE wishes to distinguish summative evaluations from diagnostic evaluations aimed at situating the pupil. These will be kept in first secondary. Schools that wish to do so can also conduct these assessments in 3rd, 4th and 5th year. It is important to specify that these evaluations have an “indicative” aim. They cannot therefore lead to an encrypted note entered in the ballot.
"Exceptional" grade repetition
As for repetition, the WBE network follows the logic promoted by the Minister of Education. "Taking into account the unprecedented situation of this school year, the repetition of a pupil must remain a strictly exceptional measure and duly justified", one can read in the directive. The second sessions being quite simply abolished this year, the decision cannot wait until September.
Finally, in order to avoid the controversy of April 30, the pedagogical days involving a suspension of classes must be postponed to the 2021-2022 school year. Whether in basic or secondary. “With this in mind, the WBE support process for schools in wave 3 of the piloting plans is suspended and will resume next school year. "
Disparity between networks
By virtue of the principle of pedagogical freedom, it is up to the organizing authorities to count on the conduct or not of the examinations. Unlike external tests, the minister can only make recommendations. If his call for benevolence seems to have been heard from all sides, the maintenance or not of the exams is not unanimous. In the free network (denominational and non-denominational) and the subsidized official (municipalities and provinces), decisions are taken in dispersed order.
The Segec (general secretariat of Catholic education) recalled the freedom enjoyed by each of these organizing powers. "A certain benevolence is required, as the minister suggests in her circular," said spokesperson Christian Carpentier. Before adding: "We must trust the educational teams on how to organize the end-of-year exams at best in the exceptional circumstances that we know. The same logic applies on the side of the Cpeons, the federation of organizing powers of the subsidized official secondary. The Felsi (federation of independent subsidized free schools) will bring together its ordinary secondary management on Wednesday 5 May to "bring out a common position".
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