The South African Comprehensive Assessment Institute (SACAI) has come under fire recently after a glaring error in a matric Geography exam papers forced 967 pupils in KwaZulu-Natal into quarantine last Wednesday. 😳 Questions worth 79 marks contained errors, an issue discovered during the reading session before the official start of the exam.
After the error was spotted, the students were quarantined and issued the correct paper.
The affected pupils were from 85 exam centres administrated by SACAI, one of four examination boards under exams quality assurer Umalusi. The acting CEO of SACAI, Chris Klopper, said that Umalusi ” justifiably seriously berated” them after they reported the incident, “as it is not acceptable to make such an error,” News24 reported.
Education experts and unions have condemned the incident as unacceptable.
Meanwhile, the affected students have rewritten the exam after the correct paper was given to them— but not without added stress to an already gruelling matric process. Parents and pupils are understandably frustrated, with some calling for better oversight and accountability to prevent such errors in future.
This incident comes as South Africa debates education reforms, including improvements to the matric system. While exam leaks and errors aren’t new, the scale of this mishap has reignited discussions about the country’s readiness to modernise assessments and tighten examination protocols.
Here’s hoping these students, who have already faced so many challenges, can finish their exams with dignity and without further drama.
But wait, this isn’t the first time something like this has happened in the matric exams. In 2023, the Department of Basic Education confirmed a mistake in Physical Sciences Paper 2, which caused some confusion for the 213,412 candidates writing the exam, and that’s not all. In the North West, the same Physical Sciences paper had missing grid lines in one question, which impacted a crucial six-mark question.
Over in isiZulu First Additional Language (Paper 2), 64 students were caught off guard when they found out that new poems and short stories had been introduced, but they hadn’t been told about it, leaving them to prepare for outdated material. Then, there was Geography Paper 1, which faced its issues, with some Afrikaans translations were so poor that they led to problematic questions for students—again, confusing.
Limpopo also bore the brunt of some significant printing issues. In Civil Service, over 60 marks were affected, though the exact number was not made public. Construction and Woodworking exams had their own challenges, with errors costing 31 and 14 marks, respectively, and over 20 marks affected in Woodworking. These errors prompted big adjustments, particularly in Limpopo, where the errors were most severe.
Who can forget the “impossible” question in the Maths Paper 2 exam of 2022? A question worth seven marks was so flawed that students couldn’t solve it. As a result, they were marked out of 93 instead of 100. An independent panel had to investigate how this went unnoticed during the review process. The panel had to submit a final report to Umalusi before the results were released.
While these annual exam errors may seem like an unfortunate routine, they raise important questions about the processes in place for reviewing and printing the matric papers. With thousands of students affected each year, it’s clear that a more robust system is needed to ensure accuracy and fairness.
Note: Further edits were made to this article after publication.
