Many examinees at the grammar school in the Hamburg district of Blankenese must have broken out in a cold sweat during their math exam. The students racked their brains over one task in particular. In the meantime, the school management had to concede: the task on analytical geometry could not actually be solved.
A wrong number had crept in, so that the calculation didn’t add up. First, the “Hamburger Morgenpost” reported on the breakdown. Accordingly, the schools had initially received false exam documents from the school authorities. A correction was made the morning before the exam, but the school in Blankenese apparently did not take it into account.
The school authorities therefore see the error in the local school in the matter: “This is a completely normal and well-known procedure that is used every year. There was still enough time to exchange the tasks before the exam started,” said the spokesman for the school authorities , Peter Albrecht, opposite “T-Online”. The correction mail was sent at 7.58 a.m., the check would not have started until nine o’clock. Apparently the error happened when typing the tasks.
Headmaster Michael Koops expressed his contrition in the “Hamburger Abendblatt”: “Unfortunately, this correction has not been observed here. We are very sorry, mistakes happen to us too.” A student told the “Hamburger Morgenpost” that she had “caught her teeth unsuccessfully with the task” and was therefore no longer able to solve other tasks. This is probably what happened to some of her classmates – even if the school authorities point out that the task could have been solved theoretically, but that this “did not correspond to the expectations in the Abitur”.
The further procedure is now being discussed, the school authorities and the school are in contact. One possibility would be for the students to repeat the exam. “The students affected must not suffer any disadvantages from the mistake,” explains Headmaster Koops. “That’s the most important thing for us.”
Sources: “Hamburger Morgenpost” (paid content) / “Hamburger Abendblatt” (paid content) / “T-Online”
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