Soroti municipality P.7 candidates fail 2016 PLE Mock.

Soroti municipality has registered a drop in a number of first graders in this year's Primary leaving Examination mock, according to the results released on Monday.

A total of 2122 candidates registered for 2016 PLE Mock, 78% of these were under Universal primary education.

Out of 2,122 candidates who sat for the mocks, 180 obtained grade one, compared to 252 first graders last year, 986 obtained second grade, 307 obtained third grades, 377 obtained grade 4.

The Municipal Inspector of Schools (MIS), the chairperson Soroti municipal academic committee Paul Etiang said candidates excelled in social studies with Religious Education, Mathematics and Integrated science.

At least 224 failed the examinations and are a under grade U while 27 did not sit for the exams. Independent Baptist  primary school, Goshen primary school, Kings Kid P/s ,Mama Theresa P/S, Jamiler Primary school, Madera girls primary school,  Unity premier P/S, Soroti Christian Primary school, Oderai P/S and Soroti parents primary school emerged as the best performing areas with no failure rates recorded.

Others with marginal failure rates are St. Jude , life Way, Shalom, Madera Boys, Ebenzer,  Jozan, amen, St. Martha, Soroti Dem, Mt. olives and Majengo among others.

The schools that performed the worst and therefore recorded the highest failure rate include Aloet P/S, Aminit P/S, Favour P/S, Community P/S, Grace hill P/S,  and Little Apostles primary school among  others.

However, Etiang added that the number of candidates has gone up compared to that of previous years.

Speaking after the release of the results, the municipal inspector of schools Patty Emokori attributed the poor performance to high absenteeism and late coming among learners.

"We released during inspection that most candidates were absent from school at least thrice a week and as leaders we are going to embark on class level meetings with teachers and parents to discuss a way forward .