A total of 1,224,371 candidates have been registered to sit for the 2023 final examinations in the three education cycles; Primary Leaving Examination (PLE), Uganda Certificate of Education (UCE), and Uganda Advanced Certificate of Education (UACE).
The Executive Director of Uganda National Examination Board- UNEB Dan Odongo, announced this while releasing the 2023 Examination Time Tables for PLE, UCE, and UACE examinations on Wednesday. The candidates are 51 per cent female and 49 per cent male.
“We have recorded a percentage increase of 12,690 (13.5 per cent) at the UACE level, which is a total of 110,579 candidates this year, as compared to 97,889 last year,” Odongo told Journalists at the Uganda Media Centre in Kampala. He added that the UCE level recorded a percentage increase of 14,988 (4.3 per cent) in candidature, from 349,433 to 364,421 candidates this year.
However, there is a 10 per cent decline in PLE candidates, from 832,809 last year to 749,371 this year. Odong clarified that this reduction aligns with the typical number of learners expected to take the PLE annually, save for the previous years which saw inflated numbers due to the clog in the system caused by COVID-19 disruptions.
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Odong said that This year’s national examinations will commence on Friday, October 13, with the briefing of UCE candidates and run until November 17, 2023, while PLE will be conducted from November 7 to 9, 2023 and UACE, will be conducted from November 10 – December 1, 2023.
Odong once re-echoed UNEB’s long-term plea to teachers, school heads, and parents to prepare their learners to avoid cheating which might result in the cancellation of their examination results.
In the same development, Odong said that while the actual examination under the New Lower Secondary School Curriculum will take place next year, 2024, preparations are ongoing to assess learners under this curriculum.
“We have just completed a countrywide pre-test of the test items, and are currently analyzing the outcome. The pretest exercise was conducted in 220 schools and involved 6,000 students. During the pretest, the Board interacted with the learners of Senior Three (the class that did the pretest) and collected valuable insights from the students.”
“Views of teachers are also being collected. These, and the analysis of the results of the pretest will inform the Board’s decisions on the final paper formats.” He said
