ENAFEP 2023: "We had to follow the national curriculum. That's what we prepared our students for, and they did well" (Marcel Mayombo, head of the finalists at Jésus-Christ ma référence school).

A total of 900 students, including 474 girls, took the certification exams on Thursday, June 1, 2023, at the Masina 1 testing site and the Masina 2 center set up on the grounds of Don Bosco Elementary School in the Tshangu Educational Province. On this first day of testing, they had to answer fifteen (15) questions in French and ten (10) on general knowledge. “No major incidents were reported. The children worked hard, and I was reassured to see students leaving just a few minutes after receiving the exam, which proves they were well prepared. All that remains is to wait for the results," said the center director, Roger Mayengele Mundele. Since any exam requires diligent and substantial preparation, the assistant principal of the Jesus Christ Ma Référence Modern School expressed confidence in the prospects of his school’s candidates. "We had to follow the national curriculum. That’s the basis on which we prepared our students; we used past exam questions and also showed our students how to complete the administrative section of their exam booklets. That’s how we prepared our students to face these exams without fear," added Marcel Mayombo, the school’s senior class coordinator. The ENAFEP aims to assess students’ academic achievements by opening the doors to the final stage of basic education to all those who manage to obtain their Primary School Completion Certificate, a diploma from the Congolese education system. For the 2022–2023 academic year, the DRC registered 2,119,100 candidates, including 1,020,448 girls, to take the National Primary School Completion Exam (ENAFEP). Deborah Kabuya