Not all of nurses’ exam to be retaken

By Fel V. Maragay
Manila Standard Today

THE nursing graduates who passed the licensing exams in June will need to retake only two parts of the test where questions were leaked, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo said yesterday.

She gave this assurance to a nursing graduate from the Lyceum University of the Philippines, who had approached her as she was inspecting a tree felled by Typhoon Milenyo in front of St. Jude Church just outside Malacañang.

“It will only be part three and five,” she told the nursing graduate who identified himself as Mark Soriano. “And it will be done before the next [licensing] exam, probably in December.”

The President told Soriano, who said he had passed the test without cheating, that a new exam was the only way to remove the stigma surrounding the test leaks.

She also said that the new exam would not punish those who had passed fairly and would be subsidized by the government.

Earlier, the President’s spokesman said her decision on the nursing exams was final.

“We ask for full cooperation from all sectors concerned,” Presidential Spokesman Ignacio Bunye said. “Her only wish is to uphold the integrity of the Philippine nursing profession, which is known to be one of the best in the world.”

The Palace has said that the retest will apply only to those who passed the exam in areas where leaks were reported.

A total of 17,322 out of the 40,000 nursing graduates who took the June exam passed it.

Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita said Labor Secretary Arturo Brion would meet officials of the Professional Regulation Commission to decide who would retake the test.

A number of successful examinees have grumbled that it would be unfair to require them to retake the test because it would entail more expenses and delay their hiring.

Leaders of some nursing associations have accused the President of preempting the decision of the Court of Appeals on a pending complaint to invalidate the results of the June exams.

But Bunye said the President had realized that unless they took the exams again, the stigma of the leaks would hound this year’s batch of nurses.

Senator Richard Gordon, who led a Senate investigation into the leaks, welcomed the President’s decision.

“I have long maintained that the only way to put closure to this matter is, at the very least, by way of requiring a retake of tests 3 and 5 of the board exams for everyone shown to have received the leaked exam questions,” he said.

And those responsible for the leaks should be caught and punished, Gordon said.

With Joyce Pangco Pañares and Roy Pelovello