Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe yesterday said in Parliament that the government was looking for the possibility of holding both GCE Ordinary and Advanced Level examinations together in December in order to avoid the existing delay in enrolling students to the universities.
He said the examinations could be held in the month of December and that would result in the increasing of the number of December holidays in schools and invited JVP leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake to attend meetings with education ministry officials on holding the two main examinations together.
The prime minister said so responding to a question raised by the opposition with regard to the number of students registered in the universities and the actual number enrolled for the courses of studies.
The prime minister said that the time to enrol students for the universities after finishing the AL examination should be reduced to six months. He said that he agreed with the chief opposition whip that the long-time time it took to release AL results and admit them to universities would compel students not to enter universities though they would score enough marks for the purpose.
Chief Opposition Whip Dissanayake pointed out that the students had to wait around 23 months after finishing the AL to enter the country’s universities.
Higher Education Minister Lakshman Kiriella said there was a systemic error in the prevailing procedure of enrolling students to the universities.
