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Departmental Exams

The board of trustees in each rural school was responsible for all arrangements in connection with the writing of grade eight examinations. They chose the presiding examiner, usually the present teacher. The Department of Education forwarded the supplies required to conduct the exams. The supplies consisted of : envelopes with attachable identification coupons for the candidates’ answer papers, foolscap, blotting paper and if required, graph paper or drawing paper. There were instructions for the presiding examiners. These instructions had to be followed to a T. There were forms for conducting the exam, the timetable, tally lists and the presiding examiner’s declaration. The examiner was responsible for the safe keeping of the exams on their arrival. Students were given some fast rules and regulations. If a student failed one departmental exam he would have to repeat his whole year of schooling.

In " Memoirs of Mary Carritt Nelson", Mrs. Nelson tells how at Carritt School they had various teachers, who were not really qualified to teach the Alberta Course of studies. In 1909, they got a qualified teacher, Mrs. Baxter. Some of the students had been in grade 8 for two years, without any particular effort made to prepare them for the provincial public school examinations. Mrs. Baxter informed them that she was going to help them pass these departmentals. She drilled them very hard on the necessary qualifying lessons on which the tests were based. As Mrs. Baxter came to Carritt School at Easter she didn’t have much time. When these students wrote their departmentals , they were all successful and received diplomas from the Department of Education in 1909.

Sometime later departmental exams were administered to grade nines instead of grade eight.