The Caribbean island nation of Dominica has announced notable across-the-board progress in student performance on the 2026 regional examinations administered by the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC), with the country’s Ministry of Education framing the outcomes as clear proof of systemic improvement across its education sector.
Preliminary official results for this year’s exams were publicly unveiled during a formal ceremony hosted this week by Dominica’s Ministry of Education, Human Resource Planning, Vocational Training and National Excellence. The event drew a cross-section of key education stakeholders, including senior government education officials, primary and secondary school principals, classroom teachers, participating students and their guardians, members of the press, and other community partners.
This year’s CXC assessment cycle covered five core credential pathways: the Caribbean Certificate of Secondary Level Competence (CCSLC), the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC), the Caribbean Vocational Qualification (CVQ), the Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE), and the newly launched Caribbean Vocational/Targeted Modular Assessment (CTEC) initiative.
Speaking to attendees at the launch ceremony, Chief Education Officer Dr. Jeffrey Blaize explained that the 2026 results should be interpreted as more than just a snapshot of individual student achievement. When measured against regional performance benchmarks, he noted, the outcomes also act as a reliable indicator of how effective the national education system has been in delivering learning outcomes. “We are indeed proud of our students,” Dr. Blaize told the audience, emphasizing that the overall quality of student performance has improved steadily compared to results from recent years. This year’s cohort, he confirmed, turned in exceptionally strong results that outpace performance from the recent past. “They deserve a round of applause. This year, our results revealed that our students have performed extremely well, even better than in the recent past. More specifically, the quality of our students has significantly improved.”
Dr. Blaize added that the ceremony was not just a venue to release official scores, but also an opportunity to honor the hard work, resilience, and growth that students across the country demonstrated throughout the academic year, while highlighting the wide range of future opportunities open to graduates. He also offered a reminder to students that even as they celebrate their successes, a single set of examination results does not define a person’s inherent worth, innate ability, or long-term future trajectory. “There are many pathways to success and our education system must continue to ensure that every young person has an opportunity to find and pursue that pathway,” he said. “We are proud that we have made significant gains in areas where we expressed concern in past years.”
Among the most encouraging gains is progress in a long-troubled subject area: mathematics. Dr. Blaize revealed that numeracy pass rates have jumped 10 percentage points compared to 2025 results, putting the national average 7 percentage points above the baseline average that the ministry set years ago. He called the improvement “probably the highest in recent memory.”
Another key win for the education system came in School-Based Assessments (SBA), a mandatory graded component for most CXC subjects. Three years prior, in 2023, Dr. Blaize had publicly called out the widespread issue of students failing to submit SBA assignments, a problem that was needlessly dragging down overall student grades. At that time, the ministry committed to implementing targeted measures to fix the issue. While incremental progress was seen in 2025, officials were still not satisfied with the submission rate. This year, however, over 90% of schools achieved full SBA submission, with many schools hitting a 99% completion rate or higher. “This is worth celebrating. We are aiming for 100 percent next year,” Dr. Blaize said.
Beyond test scores, Dr. Blaize emphasized that holistic education extends far beyond examination results. If the education system is to properly prepare young people for full and productive lives, he argued, it must prioritize opportunities for students to build real-world skills and contribute to their communities, and those contributions deserve to be recognized alongside academic achievement. He called on schools across the country to prioritize the development of core soft skills in students, including critical thinking, creative problem-solving, independent decision-making, confidence, strong character, and personal discipline. He also encouraged schools to expand participation in extracurricular activities such as volunteer work, student leadership programs, club participation, and sports, and to formally recognize these contributions during school graduation and awards ceremonies, a practice that he said is often overlooked even as schools encourage students to take part.
Looking ahead to the 2026-2027 academic year, Dr. Blaize announced that the Ministry of Education will place an increased focus on expanding and deepening stakeholder participation across all levels of the education system, adding that the ministry welcomes constructive feedback from all partners, including the media.