SSC pass rate hits 19-year low

This year’s SSC results painted a grim picture, with the pass rate across the nine general education boards hitting a 19-year low and GPA-5 achievers falling to their lowest level since 2020.

The decline was evident across almost every aspect of the results compared with the previous year. The overall pass rate fell by four percentage points while the number of students obtaining highest-grade point average, GPA-5, dropped sharply.

Meanwhile, the number of institutions where not a single student passed more than doubled.

Amid the disappointing results, female students continued to outperform their male counterparts in both pass rates and GPA-5 achievements. Girls have now led boys in pass rates for 10 consecutive years and in GPA-5 achievements for nine years.

Education officials pointed to several reasons behind this year’s decrease in SSC results. The fall in pass rate was largely driven by weak performance in English and mathematics and the low pass rate among students in the humanities group.

Officials also noted that a stricter evaluation process contributed to the lower pass rate, suggesting that tighter marking standards exposed gaps in students’ preparedness.

Education Minister ANM Ehsanul Hoque Milon, while holding a press briefing on the results yesterday at his Secretariat office, defended the decline in SSC and equivalent examination results, saying that students were given marks according to their actual performance.

“A student received marks according to how much they studied. You cannot award marks freely in examination scripts,” he said.

After many years, the education ministry has failed to publish the results within 60 days of completion of the tests. The results were originally scheduled to be published on July 20.

Milon apologised for the delay in publishing the results, citing floods and other factors. This is the first time a public examination result has been published under the Tarique Rahman-led BNP administration, which took office in mid-February.

A total of 18,29,485 students sat for the SSC and equivalent exams across all 11 boards -- general, madrasa, and technical. The combined pass rate across all boards was 62.25 percent, down by 6.2 percentage points from last year. A total of 1,16,676 students obtained GPA-5, compared with 1,39,032 in 2025.

The combined results also show the number of institutions recording a 100 percent pass rate dropped to 669 from 984 the previous year, while the number of institutions with a zero-pass rate rose to 312 from 134.

Asked about the 312 educational institutions where no students passed, the education minister said the government would take measures to improve their performance.

He added that the number of institutions recording zero-pass rates had been four to five times higher between 2001 and 2006, when measures were taken to curb cheating in public examinations.

LOWEST PASS RATE

In the nine general education boards, 64.05 percent of students passed the SSC exams, while 1,06,009 achieved GPA-5.

An analysis of previous years’ data shows that this year’s pass rate across the nine general education boards is the lowest since 2007, when it was 57.37 percent, according to the Bangladesh Bureau of Educational Information and Statistics.

The number of students securing GPA-5 is also the lowest in six years.

Girls continued to shine in the results. This year, 66.68 percent of female students passed the SSC tests, compared with 57.86 percent of male students -- a difference of 8.82 percentage points.

Among the total GPA-5 achievers, 63,896 are girls and 52,780 are boys.

Prof Bilkis Yasmin, controller of examinations of the Sylhet Education Board, said weaker performance in English and mathematics contributed to the drop in the results.

Talking to The Daily Star, Sylhet Education Board Chairman Prof Shahidul Alam, meanwhile, said the poor performance of humanities students was also responsible for decreasing the pass rate.

The results show that the pass rate among humanities students stood at 48.74 percent, compared with 80.64 percent among science students and 64.29 percent among business studies students.

In last year’s exams, the pass rate in English across the nine general boards was from 70 to 94 percent, while the pass rate in mathematics ranged from 64 to 87 percent.

This year, the pass rate in English ranged from 67 to 81 percent, while 69 to 83 percent of students passed mathematics.

BOARD-WISE PERFORMANCE

Mymensingh recorded the lowest overall pass rate among the nine boards at 57.39 percent, while Dhaka topped the list with 71.63 percent. Dhaka was the only board to record a pass rate above 70 percent.

Jashore came second with 66.27 percent, followed by Cumilla at 65.42 percent and Rajshahi at 63.67 percent.

The pass rates were 60.35 percent in Barishal, 59.48 percent in Chattogram, 58.33 percent in Sylhet, and 58.05 percent in Dinajpur.

Prof Md Anamul Hoque, secretary of Mymensingh Education Board, told this newspaper, “I would not say why other boards did better and ours did worse. I would say that our result reflects the actual scenario.”

“We will strengthen the monitoring system under the education ministry. Efforts are also underway to make educational activities more effective so that students become more focused on their studies.”

In terms of GPA-5 achievers, Dhaka topped among the boards with 33,253 students, while Barishal remained at the lowest with 2,778 students.

Board officials said students who wish to challenge their results may apply for review from August 11 to 17. Details are available on the education boards’ websites.