With the matric exams under way, the Department of Basic Education is keeping a close eye on the state of readiness of the 187 marking centres across the country.
The department’s director-general, Hubert Mweli kicked off his visit on Sunday in a bid to assess centres in some provinces.
Mweli has so far visited centres in Gauteng and Mpumalanga to ensure that centres are ready as soon as the exams are completed on December 9.
Speaking to IOL, department spokesperson Elijah Mhlanga said there are up to 53 926 marking moderators who will be posted across all the centres.
In terms of security measures, Mhlanga said that scripts are never tampered with at the marking stage and there have never been challenges in marking centres.
He said that the marking system has not changed. “The writing is pen and paper, therefore marking is pen and paper with human beings doing the work.”
He explained that the system of marking manuals is reliable and it is significant because there is no dependence on electricity.
The exams began on October 31.
Mhlanga said that marking would officially start at the marking centres on December 7 and run for a period of 10 days.
In December last year, exam scripts went missing after Albert Moroka High School marking centre in the Free State was damaged in a storm.
Fortunately, the department announced that all the exam papers that were affected by the storm had been found and accounted for.
“There were 25 519 scripts for accounting P2 and business studies P2 that were delivered for processing at the Albert Moroka High School marking centre. In business studies P2, the one script that we were looking for has been found,” the department said.
IOL