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Published on July 24, 2007

The grade-point average, or GPA, is calculated from student classroom performance. The exam is the Ordinary National Educational Test, or Onet. The National Institute of Educational Testing Service administers it.

"The formula will prevent problems arising from differing grading standards among various schools," Education Minister Wijit Srisa-arn said yesterday after discussions with the testing service and the Office of Basic Education Commission.

Due to concerns about different grading standards, education authorities scrapped a plan to give 70-per-cent weighting to cumulative grade-point averages, or GPAX, and the rest to Onet scores.

The calculation will give high scores to a student who has high a GPA and high Onet score. When compared with GPA alone, student scores from the calculation will drop if they have high GPAs but low Onet scores. For a student with a high Onet score but low GPA, his or her scores from the calculation will be higher in comparison with the GPA alone.

"The result from the formula calculation will reflect students' real academic performances," Wijit said adding that Chulalongkorn University had been assigned to develop the formula. "Before the 2010 academic year, we may experiment with the formula at some pivotal schools," he said.

However, Wijit said authorities were still debating acceptable passing grades for grade-12 students. Currently, grade-12 students pass if they receive a D in any subject and they can graduate if they achieve a GPA of at least 1.00.

Wijit believed grade-12 students should have at least a D-plus in all subjects before they can graduate from school.