Students wearing face mask could be seen doing their revision in a classroom before the SPM examinations start.
KUCHING (Feb 22): The long delayed Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) 2020 examination finally got underway today with 35,312 student candidates across Sarawak sitting for the examination while observing strict standard operating procedures (SOP).
According to State Education Department director Dr Norisah Suhaili, the breakdown of the student candidates sitting for SPM 2020 was 33,064 candidates from national secondary schools (SMK), 942 from private secondary schools, 361 from schools of different agencies aside from Ministry of Education and 945 private candidates.
“All teachers and students must observe SOP while being inside the school compound at all times. Stay focus and revise your schoolwork as SPM is an important public examination,” she said in a brief comment.
In term of percentage, it was stated student candidates from SMK comprised a majority of 93.63 per cent sitting for the examinations, 2.67 per cent was from private schools, 1.02 per cent from schools under other agencies and another 2.68 per cent registered as private candidates.
Dr Norisah pointed out there was a total of 294 examination centres throughout the state with 226 area supervisors and 2,566 examination prefects.
The SPM examinations were held starting today (Feb 22) until March 25. The first papers were Bahasa Melayu paper one and two.
A survey by The Borneo Post at SMK St Thomas and SMK St Mary here had saw students wearing face mask and had their body temperature taken before being allowed to enter the school compound. Media personnel were restricted from entering.
The SPM examinations were originally scheduled to be held from Nov 16 to Dec 7 last year before being postponed to Jan 6 to Feb 9.
The reschedule was made to allow students to have adequate amount of time to prepare for the examinations due to the extension of Movement Control Order (MCO) last year.
On Nov 8, Senior Minister (Education) Dr Radzi Jidin announced that SPM would be postponed again to Feb 22 while Sijil Tinggi Persekolahan Malaysia (STPM) would begin on March 8.