Current Press Releases

The Council of Ministers of Education, Canada (CMEC) has released the 2004 School Achievement Indicators Program (SAIP) Science III results, which included the Northwest Territories as a jurisdiction.

The assessment, which was administered in the spring of 2004, is designed to evaluate the overall level of knowledge and concept understanding of science over time amongst English and French-speaking students aged 13 and 16. This is the third time that the assessment has been administered since it was created in 1996.

Achievement criteria are assessed on a five-level scale. Most 13-year-olds were expected to achieve or exceed level 2, while 16-year-olds were expected to achieve or exceed level 3. In the NWT, almost half of 13-year-olds achieved level 2 or higher, compared to 71% nationally. 49% of NWT 16-year-olds achieved level 3 or higher compared to 64% nationally.

It is not possible to compare NWT results from previous years, as this is the first time the NWT has been assessed in science as a separate jurisdiction from Nunavut. Additionally, in most jurisdictions, a random sample of students participate in the assessment, but because of the small size of our population in the NWT, the test was administered to all students aged 13 and 16. As a result, unlike other jurisdictions, NWT students participate regardless of their grade level at the time of the test, which may skew our comparative results.

The Department of Education, Culture and Employment has already taken steps to improve the level of science achievement for NWT students, with the implementation of the new Western and Northern Canadian Protocol (WNCP) science curriculum in the fall of 2005. It is anticipated that this curriculum will have a positive result on SAIP science results when they are next administered.

For more information, please contact:

Shawn McCann
Manager, Public Affairs
Phone:(867) 920-6222
Cell: (867) 444-3386
shawn_mccann@gov.nt.ca