July 2011 Nurse Licensure Examination Result - July 2011 Nurse Board Exam Result

‘Some nursing examinees should not take test again’ – Recto

Sen. Ralph Recto said yesterday that those who took and passed the June nursing licensure examination in the Visayas and Mindanao should not be required to take it again.

He also batted for the exemption of those who took the test in Legazpi, Tuguegarao, and Lucena cities.

"Why punish them when they were far from the scene of the crime so to speak? Proximity, or the lack of it, rules them out as participants in the cheating," Recto said.

"If there’s robbery in Manila, would you take the fingerprints of people in far away Zamboanga? I don’t think the leaked questions were transmitted through mental telepathy," Recto said.

The June 11 and 12 tests were held in the cities of Cebu, Iloilo, and Tacloban in the Visayas and in Cagayan de Oro, Davao, and Zamboanga in Mindanao.

Recto said the National Bureau of Investigation’s probe into the leak of questions ahead of the test concluded that the incident was confined to ManilaBaguio City. and

"Should there be a court-sanctioned re-test, then it should only be in these cities, and only on subjects which have been put under a cloud of doubt," he said.

Recto said Visayas, Mindanao, Southern Tagalog, Bicol, and Cagayan Valley examinees of the 500-question test passed it "fair and square."

"There is not an iota of evidence to suggest that tests held in the South were attended with anomalies, so there’s no reason to torture these honest nurses with another round of testing," he said.

Recto said the planned re-take of the nursing exams should be given free of charge.

"Maraming kalabaw ang mabebenta kung pagbabayarin uli ang mga mga kukuha ng test," he said.

As this developed, the House of Representatives Committee on Health yesterday warned government law enforcement agencies against losing track of the task to pursue charges against those involved in the nursing board examination scandal.

In separate press statements, Iloilo Reps. Ferjenel Biron and Janette Garin, both vice chairmen of the House Committee on Health, said Malacañang’s intervention into the controversy should not be used as an excuse by investigative agencies to slow down on their probe and the bid to pin down the culprits behind the leakage.

Both doctors, Biron and Garin welcomed the decision of President Arroyo to order a partial retake of the examinations, saying the move is expected to restore confidence of the international community to the nursing profession in the Philippines.

Earlier, Pangasinan Rep. Generoso Tulagan (Kampi, Pangasinan) described Arroyo’s directive as a "Solomonic decision" on the part of the Chief Executive.

Biron warned that the country should expect serious economic setbacks had not Arroyo made the decision.

He dared the National Bureau of Investigation to file the necessary charges against employees and officials of the Board of Nursing and the Professional Regulations Commission involved in the scam.

Garin said Arroyo’s decision should not sidetrack the ongoing probe on the incident.

Garin recalled that during a congressional hearing on the controversy, several lawmakers chided NBI officials for the sloppy investigation being conducted by the agency.

She said lawmakers expect the NBI to pinpoint responsibility and file charges against all those involved in the scandal, including the review center which allegedly benefited from the leakage.

"I support the decision of Malacañang to call for retake of Tests 3 and 5 of the nursing board examinations. It will definitely prove to the global community that we do not tolerate cheating and we see to it that standards in the nursing profession are being maintained," she explained.

The two lawmakers said the ongoing congressional inquiry into the incident will have to be pursued until the Lower House is able to craft a legislation that would plug loopholes in the laws governing the nursing profession and state examinations.

Earlier, Tulagan stressed that the presidential decision was carefully made after a comprehensive assessment of the situation.

"It was a Solomonic decision on the part of the President. We hope this would address the concerns on the controversy that have been aired by various quarters, particularly the leaders of the nursing profession," said Tulagan, chairman of the House Committee on Public Works and Highways. (with a report by Ben R. Rosario)

Posted by Anonymous on Monday, October 02, 2006 at 2:10 PM | Permalink