It is not just the student’s but the families who are affected by the exam postponement, said Serdang MP Ong Kian Ming in his statement today.

Following the leak of the UPSR Science paper initially scheduled for today, the exam has been pushed to September 30. The announcement made yesterday, came as a surprise to students expecting to have the exam today.

Calling this a major error on the part of the Examination Syndicate, Ong highlighted that the was not just the 472, 853 primary school students who are affected by the decision, but also the parents and families as well.

He said that parents may have planned for holidays or activities would have to make adjustments to their schedules.

“Students who were preparing mentally to complete their UPSR exams in three days will now have to wait another 3 weeks,” he added.

This also alters the confidence parents and students have in the secrecy and integrity of future exam papers, he said.

What is preventing PT3, SPM and STPM students from facing the same ordeal?

The PT3 exam for secondary school students will take place from October 13 to 17, while the SPM written papers would be from November 3 to December 2, while STPM written papers would be from November 3 to November 10.

Although Deputy Prime Minister and Education Minister Muhyiddin Yassin has apologized for the leak, Ong Kian Ming urged the Education Minister to provide the assurance that other examination papers not face similar leaks.

“The integrity and security of the PT3, SPM and STPM papers are all the more important given that there may not be enough time at the end of the year to retake or to postpone these exams,” he said.

He added that with the easy availability of smartphones and soft copies of exam papers, the Examination Syndicate must work doubly hard to ensure the integrity of the papers.

“For example, the PT3 exams are to be downloaded into the computers of teachers in the schools and this make them easy targets for hackers and other irresponsible parties who want to ‘steal’ these papers for commercial and personal interest.”

In the light of advancement from physical exam papers to the current soft copies in teachers computers, Ong said that necessary steps needs to be taken to guard the soft copies.

“It is worth noting that there were rumours that certain SPM papers had been leaked last year, in 2013. At that time, the Examinations Syndicate dismissed these rumours and allowed the SPM exams to continue as planned.”

Ong said that a special task force was formed by the Education Ministry to investigate the rumours, which failed to produce any findings .

“If this special task force had done its work, would it have been able to make recommendations to prevent the leaking of the UPSR Science papers?” he asked. -TheRocket