Egypt’s Minister of Education Tarek Shawki has certified the 2016/17 Thanaweya Amma exam results, which show a 72.4 percent pass rate nationwide, state-run news agency MENA reported on Wednesday.
The pass rate for the previous year was 75.7 percent, Shawki said.
The final results for all Thanaweya Amma students are set to be published on the education ministry website on Wednesday afternoon.
The Thanaweya Amma examinations are the last stage in the Egyptian high-school education system. Students who pass the exams are awarded the General Secondary Education Certificate.
On Tuesday night, Shawki called 56 students who had achieved top grades to congratulate them on their scores and the succesful completion of their secondary education.
Students will soon be applying to public universities based on their Thanaweya Amma grades. This phase usually starts within a week after the official announcement of the results.
The highly competitive Thanaweya Amma examinations have been marred in the past by repeated cheating and leaking of exam documents.
This year, Egypt introduced a new booklet system for the examinations to reduce the possibility of errors in the marking process and eliminate the risk of exam leaks.
The new system requires students to submit their answers on the same sheet as the questions, as opposed to on a separate sheet, as was previously the case.