Primary school

Primary school is for free in Malawi and children start Primary School normally between 4 -  6 years old. To finish primary school they have to pass the PSLE (Primary School Leaving Exam) in standard 8, which is normally around the age of 13 or 14 years old. Based on their PSLE result the child will be selected for a secondary school.

The PSLE exam is done in the following 6 subjects:

English
Mathematics
Chichewa
Life skills
Science (like chemistry)
Social science (like geography and history)

The amount of points a child can score for each subject is translated into the letter A, B, C, D or E.
The criteria might change every year, but on average the point system looks like this:
A             85 – 100 points
B             70 – 84 points
C             50 – 69 points
D             40 – 49 points
E             below 39 points

So an A score is the best a child can get for a subject and with an E score they fail for the subject.
If a child fails for English and / or Mathematics they won’t pass standard 8, no matter what the score for any other subject is.

Depending on how good the results of a child are, they can be selected for National Boarding school, District boarding school or Community Day Secondary School (CDSS). The children with the best scores are selected for National Boarding School (mostly A and B scores), children that score a little less for District Boarding School (mostly B scores) and children with mostly C or D scores for Community Day Secondary School.

The children cannot choose by themselves to which secondary school they will go. This selection is done by the government and the name of the secondary school is given to the primary school around early September.