Ministry condenses PEP curriculum

The Ministry of Education, Skills, Youth and Information has announced that it is cutting back the amount of material students are expected to master in the upcoming Primary Exit Profile (PEP).

Acting Chief Education Officer Terry-Ann Thomas-Gayle said the revised structure is aimed at helping teachers and students focus on the most essential learning outcomes, particularly in the wake of disruptions caused by Hurricane Melissa last October.

Under the revised framework, the ministry has reduced curriculum objectives across several subjects, narrowing the focus to the most essential learning outcomes required for student progression. At the grade-six level, objectives for Language Arts have been reduced from 138 to 90, while Mathematics at the grade-four level has been condensed from 124 objectives to 48 core targets.

"In Mathematics for grade four, we went through and we looked at all the objectives for Mathematics at grade four. We had 124 objectives. We looked at the most essential objectives for Mathematics... that means the students must achieve these in order to move to the next grade level... and we saw where we had 48 such objectives," she explained.

Thomas-Gayle, speaking during a post-Cabinet press briefing at the Office of the Prime Minister yesterday, said the streamlined curriculum ensures students concentrate on foundational competencies without being disadvantaged.

"We have done a reprint of the curricula for grades one through nine, and we have sent it out in hard copies to the affected regions, and electronic copies are available for the other parishes," Thomas-Gayle shared.

The Acting Chief Education Officer emphasised that while the objectives have been condensed to focus on those that are essential, there will be no disadvantage for students.

"I want to reassure the public that condensing to a smaller number of objectives, the students will not be at a loss," she said.

In addition to curriculum adjustments, the ministry has finalised the structure of the 2026 PEP assessments.

Grade-six students will sit three components: an ability test, a Mathematics curriculum-based test and a Language Arts curriculum-based test.

The ability test will consist of 40 multiple-choice questions focused on quantitative and verbal reasoning, while the Mathematics and Language Arts tests will each comprise 60 multiple-choice items.

The grade-six examinations will be administered over two days, April 29 and April 30.

At the grade-five level, students will complete only performance tasks in Language Arts and Mathematics. These tasks will require students to respond to four to six open-ended questions and will be completed on June 10.

Grade-four students, meanwhile, will sit literacy and numeracy tests on June 24.

Thomas-Gayle emphasised that the high school placement system will remain unchanged. Students will continue to be placed using a combination of their grade-four PEP results from 2024, grade-five results from 2025 and the grade-six components completed in 2026.

However, a new placement mechanism will be used for a small group of grade-nine students transitioning to high school, following the suspension of the grade-nine achievement test for 2026.