Scrap Z-score: Ranil

17 January 2012 04:43 pm

Opposition Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe today in Parliament stressed the need to scrap the Z-score system for the admission of students to universities.
Mr. Wickremesinghe, in a statement to the House, said that the UNP government led by him during the 2002/2004 period had plans todo away with this system. However, he said that he could not take any step because of what he termed as the undemocratic act of dissolution of his government in 2004.

“We opposed the Z-score system right from the beginning. Instead, we should have expanded opportunities for students to gain access for higher education,” he said.

Referring to the recent crisis of the Advanced Level results, he said that the credibility of the Department of Examinations had suffered more than ever because of this problem.

“Minister Dalles Alahapperuma once said that the entire Cabinet should be held responsible for the mishap. However, these are mere utterances only. No one is there to take the responsibility,” he said.

He recalled how he sacked a Commissioner General of Examination when he was the Education Minister at that time due to a similar blunder.

Also, he asked as to why Prof. Ralfe Thatil who introduced the Z-score system was not consulted in the
formulation of a common modality for the calculation of Z-score marks of students who sat for the exam under two different syllabuses this time.

Higher Education Minister S.B. Dissanayake replied that Prof. Thatil was excluded from the expert panel that worked on this matter because there were some legal issues involved. Also, he said that Prof. Thatil faced some allegations of financial irregularities when he was the director of the Post Graduate Institute of Agriculture.

Mr. Dissanayake said that the Z-score system had many plus points as a modality for the admission of students to the university system.
(Kelum Bandara and Yohan Perera)