Peru’s Education Minister, Jaime Saavedra, highlighted the improvement in reading comprehension and mathematics achieved by students from all regions of the country and considered this achievement shows the government is "on the right track" to provide quality education.
"It's an important step. This is more hope rather than success because there is still a big gap, but there is hope and we are on the right track, I think," he said.
The latest Student Census Evaluation (ECE) 2014 conducted by the Ministry of Education showed that 44% of school second graders achieved a satisfactory performance in reading comprehension, while 26% of them reached the same level in mathematics.
These figures represent 11% and 9% increases from the previous year, respectively, and show the largest improvement in seven years, as well.
In this regard, Saavedra found necessary to carry out an in-depth analysis to determine the causes of improvement.
However, he stressed there is a set of elements that might have had a major impact on this achievement.
Among them, he noted the fact that Peruvian teachers have chosen to be thoroughly trained.
"It is not the same to have teachers on strikes than teachers in training, because they will take tests that will result in improved performance and professional development," he explained.
(END) CCR/RMB/MVB
Published: 2/27/2015