Grades Ten And Twelve Results Are Released Late

IN Namibia the practice is that the external examination results are released by mid-January of the ensuing academic year at the earliest.

Sometimes the Grade Ten results come a little earlier and the Grade Twelve results would be awaited much longer. This has through the years made it difficult for parents to know what await them and their children.
The examination process unfolds much earlier in the final quarter of the academic year and understanding is that it was planned such that the examination authorities have ample time to complete marking and sorting the results to the preference of the examination and educational departments. Still there would be hold-ups, the lead time of which would shift from year to year.
My view is that it is good that the learners sit earlier for their final examinations at the end of the academic year. This practice will enable the authorities time to carefully work through the examination papers and to ultimately post the results in such a way that the stakeholders: parents, learners as well as relatives and family friends can appraise the exercise of examination taking, the examination results and can start the process of mulling through the options if any. When the learners apply to institutions for further or alternative education it is normally done in such a way that, if option A did not work out option B can kick in and in the worst case scenario, options C and D can be dragged in.  All these options have various realities in terms of their affordability and funding possibilities. Affordability and funding possibilities as well as results in the end determine whether the learner will be in school or can be in school in the ensuing year. If all fails then the child will have to walk the streets for the following year or for the rest of her/his lifetime in search of employment, which may never be attained due to the absence of skills.
Added to this conundrum is the fact that most of the parents, from rural areas in particular, would be in the hands of their children in terms of guidance through whatever process will unfold as a result of the new situation because of their limited understanding. When the results are encouraging, then the situation is likely to be manageable and when they are bad, everyone keeps guessing what would happen.
Parents start school hopping in the event of the Grade Ten results or, college hopping in the case of the Grade Twelve results. And this is where affordability or the reality of resources kick in. Those with money exercise the options with ease and those without resources have to walk the process or give up the education of their children mid-air.
While all these problems cannot be left at the doorstep of the delays in the release of examination results, the belated release complicates matters. Parents and learners keep guessing until in the second month of the New Year and planning is complicated, let alone celebrations during the festive season.
The learners who take external examinations sit early enough for these, in time for the examination results to be released with comfortable lead time for families to prepare for the ensuing academic period. It is not fair to the parents, learners and to the entire nation that the results are kept to last minute, only for the practice to complicate or even compromise the future of children of this nation, which future is already compromised by the tenuous nature of our educational systems.