An Investigation into the Effectiveness of the Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS) in South African Schools

The paper presents the findings from current research on the impact that the Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS) curriculum subjects have on two South African Schools in Gauteng province in South Africa. The aim is to present the impact of the CAPs subjects in the school. The study did a critical evaluation of each subject to elaborate on the importance and challenges in implementing the subjects and using a qualitative research method to collect data on a group of teachers and students on their opinion on the impact of CAPs subjects. The findings suggest that even though the curriculum is effective, it needs to be improved to close the gap between public and private schools. Private schools are currently benefiting the most from the subjects and how the curriculum is structured.

Teachers’ Conceptions of Assessment Using Brown’s Four-Factor Model and DepEd Assessment Policy: Implications for Policy Review

The study determined teachers’ conceptions on assessment which were bases in developing recommendations for policy review. The study used survey questionnaires adopted from Brown’s COA-III and an additional researcher-made questionnaire from DepEd Assessment Policy. The respondents are the 408 mathematics teachers from the different schools of National Capital Region using Cluster Sampling. Teachers “strongly agreed” that assessment held the students and school accountable, it’s for the improvement of the teaching and learning process, and they don’t believe that assessment is irrelevant. The teachers also believed that a sound assessment must be standards-based, for concept development, formative and summative. Moreover, eight variables are found to be correlated: school accountability, student accountability, improvement, standards-based, concept development, formative and summative. Assessment should be designed from classroom to national levels. Teachers’ assessments may consider the factors school accountability, student accountability, improvement, standards-based, concept development, formative, and summative. Teachers should undergo extensive training concerning classroom assessment. Teachers must see to it that in every assessment they implement in their class, it should always be aligned to the learning objectives whether the assessment is formative or summative for them to be properly informed regarding the learning development and achievement of the students.

Appraisal of Self-Assessment Tax Policy in Nigeria

Implementation of self-assessment policy is seen as enhancing tax revenue generation, reducing operational cost and operating in line with international best practices. This study was designed to appraise the self-assessment tax policy in Nigeria by exploring income streams from CIT, PPT, VAT against GDP (at current basic prices) and annual budgets from 2002 to 2019. The study applying Ordinary Least Square statistics revealed the tax streams impacted GDP both in the pre and post self-assessment periods though their impacts varied. The efficiency of the implementation of the self-assessment policy tested using tax to GDP ratio and tax to budget ratio revealed pre self-assessment period performing better than the post self-assessment period as pre self-assessment period tax to GDP ratio is 6.63 per cent as against post self-assessment period tax to GDP ratio of 4.23 per cent. Also, pre self-assessment period tax to budget ratio is 119.62 per cent as against post self-assessment period ratio of 92.18 per cent. This is attributable to decline in performance during the post self-assessment period as a result of reduction in petroleum profit taxes occasioned by decline in taxable profits of companies operating in the petroleum sub-sector due to slump in global crude oil prices. The study also found Nigeria’s tax to GDP ratio to be far below average in other regions and the lack of harmonization of tax revenues by States and the federal government for a realistic evaluation.