This year 45,054 Ujian Pencapaian Sekolah Rendah (UPSR) candidates scored As in all subjects, a 0.54 percent drop compared to 46,012 candidates last year.

Malaysia Examinations Board director Dr Na’imah Ishak said the overall performance of UPSR candidates had also fallen by 0.01 point from a National Average Grade (GPN) of 2.30 last year to 2.31 this year.

“The cause for this drop is still unknown and the state Education Departments and schools will conduct a study on this later,” she said when announcing the UPSR results in Putrajaya today.

A total of 517,139 candidates sat for the UPSR this year, an increase of 3.9 percent compared to 497,691 candidates last year, whereby 98.2 percent or 507,783 candidates were from ministry schools and 1.8 percent or 9,356 candidates were from private schools.

Dr Na’imah said 286,930 candidates obtained good results this year with a minimum of C not including all As, a 1.49 percent increase compared to 269,021 candidates last year, while 17,251 more candidates were below the minimum level with all D or E or a combination of both, a 0.54 percent increase compared to 13,958 candidates last year.

She said the number of rural candidates scoring all As increased to 17,329 this year compared to 16,244 candidates last year, while urban candidates dropped to 27,681 candidates compared to 29,462 last year.

In terms of good achievement, she said both urban and rural candidates showed an increase of 149,911 urban candidates this year compared to 148,265 last year, and 136,590 rural candidates this year compared to 118,543 last year.

“This year the percentage of candidates who scored all subjects below the minimum level decreased, especially in rural areas with a 0.86 percent drop while urban areas showed a 0.20 percent drop.

“This decrease in percentage shows rural candidates are doing better in terms of minimum scores compared to urban candidates with a 0.66 percent difference,” she said.

Students with special needs

Dr Na’imah said the percentage of candidates with special needs scoring all As increased to 25 people this year compared to 17 last year, whereby they consist of three blind, seven visually impaired and 15 others with various disabilities.

She said the percentage of special need candidates who scored good results also increased by 0.44 percent with 218 people last year to 295 this year, and the overall achievement of this group went up by 0.01 GPN points compared to last year.

The number of special need candidates sitting for the UPSR this year also increased to 1,752 people compared to 1,329 last year.

In terms of subjects, Dr Na’imah said the Subject Average Grade (GPMP) showed that Bahasa Melayu - Comprehension in national schools (SK) showed a drop of 0.07 points while candidates who scored Grade A and Grade ABC also dropped by 1.6 percent and 2.6 percent.

For the subject Bahasa Melayu - Writing, national schools registered an increase of 0.03 GPMP points compared to last year, and the percentage of Grade A also increased by 3.2 percent but the percentage of Grade ABC dropped by 0.2 percent.

For the subject Bahasa Melayu - Comprehension and Writing in national-type schools (SJK) the percentage of candidates scoring Grade A both dropped by 1.5 percent and 2.8 percent, while the GPMP for Bahasa Melayu - Comprehension dropped by 0.04 points and Bahasa Melayu - Writing recorded a 0.03 point increase, she said.

Dr Na’imah said for English in SK, an improvement was seen with a 0.05 point increase in GPMP, and the percentage of candidates scoring Grade A and Grade ABC each increased by 0.8 percent and 2.6 percent compared to last year.

She said the performance for this subject in SJK dropped by 0.07 GPMP points and the percentage of candidates scoring Grade A and ABC also dropped by 1.9 percent and 1.6 percent each.

Dr Nai’mah said the overall performance for the Chinese language - Comprehension dropped by 0.01 GPMP points while Chinese language - Writing increased by 0.02 GPMP points, and Tamil - Comprehension and Writing registered a drop of 0.10 and 0.04 GPMP points each.

For the aptitude test conducted for the fourth year to indicate students’ mental preparedness to enter secondary school, she said results were not stated on UPSR exam result slips but can be obtained through the school.

UPSR examinations were conduction nationwide on Sept 11, 12 and 13 at 8,284 centres, whereby 52,172 personnel were appointed for examination administration and 11,079 examiners were appointed to conduct the subjective papers.

- Bernama