N.W.T. government adjusts weight of diploma exams for graduating students

The N.W.T. government is adjusting the weight of Grade 12 diploma exams for the remainder of this school year. Those tests will now only account for 20 per cent of a student's final mark – down from the regular 30 per cent. 

The territory's education department announced the change in a news release on Wednesday. The N.W.T. is following in the footsteps of Alberta, which made the adjustment back in September.

Both jurisdictions have cited learning disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic as rationale. 

Students rewriting a diploma exam originally taken in the 2021-2022 school year will see those new results count for 20 per cent. 

The department said it's also working with students who took the exams in November to "determine the best course of action on a case-by-case basis."

The weight of diploma exams will return to 30 per cent in September. 

'Levels the playing field'

Dean MacInnis, principal of Sir John Franklin High School in Yellowknife, told CBC News in an interview Wednesday that the move to adjust exams this year is a wise one, as many N.W.T.  students go to post-secondary school in Alberta. 

"With [the province] making that decision several months back…it certainly levels that playing field," he explained. 

"So if kids are doing the exam here, then the value of that class mark is the same as down there, and when they're applying to programs, it's the same."

The territory is also in the midst of slowly transitioning from the kindergarten to Grade 12 curriculum used in Alberta, to the one used in B.C. 

Schools will start to trial the B.C. curriculum in classrooms teaching Grades 4 to 6 and Grade 9 in the 2023 academic year, according to a timeline published on the territorial government's website.

The education department says the 2024-25 school year will be the final time N.W.T. students write Alberta's Grade 12 diploma exams.

The switch is expected to be fully implemented by 2027.