The debate over how many subjects students should sit for public examinations reveals competing visions of educational excellence, individual freedom, and the proper role of government in certification systems. When Zimbabwe’s Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education announced caps of nine subjects at Ordinary Level and three at Advanced Level, critics framed it as an assault on freedom and a barrier to exceptional students. I see it as necessary protection of system integrity and child welfare.

I must say I always without fail engage in similar debates each year when examination bodies release results. This year’s controversy centres on Mukudzei Ziveyi, a Pamushana High School student who sat twelve Advanced Level examinations and scored 56 points. The achievement generated headlines and parental pride. Yet crucial details reveal something troubling: Mukudzei attended only one lesson per week for each subject. His school, in consultation with the Zimbabwe School Examinations Council (ZIMSEC), created special examination arrangements allowing him to sit some examinations alone after others finished, accommodating timetable clashes inevitable when one student takes four times the standard subject load.

What appears as exceptional achievement masks a system distortion that raises fundamental questions about what we mean by education and what public examinations certify.

Critics misunderstand what standardisation requires. It demands neither uniformity nor identical outcomes, but rather a common framework within which variation can occur whilst maintaining system integrity and comparability.

At Ordinary Level, students have long varied between eight, nine, or occasionally more subjects. This variation occurred within clear parameters: everyone sat examinations on the same timetable, nobody required special ZIMSEC arrangements, nobody sat alone after others finished. The system accommodated individual differences without compromising the fundamental comparability that makes credentials meaningful.

Mukudzei’s case breaks this framework entirely. Schools cannot meaningfully teach twelve A-levels when students attend one lesson per week per subject. Special examination arrangements create precedents that cannot scale if multiple students demand them. Sitting alone for examinations introduces security concerns and undermines controlled assessment conditions. This represents system distortion for individual cases, not variation within a system.

The distinction matters because public examination credentials derive value from comparability. When I present A-level results to universities or employers, those institutions assume my achievement occurred under comparable conditions to other certificate holders. If these differences proliferate, credentials lose meaning for everyone.

Decades of research on expertise development, and cognitive load consistently demonstrates that mastery requires focused, sustained engagement rather than superficial exposure across many domains. Universities worldwide require three A-level subjects for admission because this represents depth sufficient for tertiary preparation. This standard emerged from accumulated experience about what preparation students need, balancing breadth (covering multiple domains) with depth (allowing genuine mastery).

Consider what one lesson per week actually means pedagogically. Deep learning requires iterative engagement with content, time for reflection and integration, opportunities to apply concepts across contexts, feedback and revision cycles, and sustained cognitive engagement that builds robust mental models. None of this occurs through weekly examination coaching sessions. Mukudzei may have passed twelve examinations, but this demonstrates examination performance, not genuine education in twelve subjects.

I speak from lived experience. I succeeded by the metrics this system values: high points, university admission, professional career. From outside, I appear as the system’s success story. Yet I know what it cost. I know the gaps in my own education where I learned to perform rather than understand. I know the struggle of unlearning examination-optimised thinking to develop genuine analytical depth later.

When I observe Mukudzei celebrated for 56 points, I recognise this pattern. He faces the same trajectory: outward success, internal gaps, and the long work of becoming properly educated after credential accumulation ends. This matters especially in fields requiring high abstraction. We produce graduates who can perform on examinations but struggle with complex problem-solving and system design precisely because they optimised for breadth over depth.

My father with his modest education can write and structure an essay better than most graduate students in literature. Earlier cohorts, studying fewer subjects more deeply, developed stronger analytical frameworks and abstract thinking capabilities. Current graduates, credentialed across more subjects, often demonstrate weaker conceptual foundations. This pattern emerges not from declining student capability but from systemic incentives that reward credential accumulation over genuine learning.

The “capacity and money” argument reveals rather than resolves the equity problem. Only students at schools like Pamushana, with parents possessing cultural capital to navigate ZIMSEC bureaucracy and resources to provide supplementary tutoring, access these opportunities. This creates a two-tier system where advantage compounds. Already-privileged students gain additional credentials that, whilst educationally superfluous (universities require only three subjects), function as status markers.

Meanwhile, equally capable students in under-resourced schools face entirely different constraints. Their capacity never gets tested because they lack money and institutional support. Their schools cannot provide one-lesson-per-week coaching across twelve subjects. Their parents cannot negotiate special ZIMSEC arrangements. This represents inequity by design, not meritocracy in action.

Public examination systems exist partly to create level playing fields where capability matters more than privilege. When ZIMSEC creates special examination arrangements for students taking excessive subjects, this consumes administrative capacity that should serve all candidates equally. These are finite resources being captured by privileged students rather than distributed equitably.

ZIMSEC functions as a public examining body establishing national standards, not a private service provider offering customised credentialing. Public examination systems serve collective goods: they create comparable credentials that universities, employers, and professional bodies can rely upon; they establish educational standards that guide school curricula and teaching practice; they provide quality assurance that protects students, families, and society from fraudulent or meaningless certification. These functions require standardisation, consistent application, and clear parameters.

Setting eligibility criteria and subject limits falls squarely within appropriate governmental functions for public examining bodies. Just as medical boards determine examination requirements for physicians and bar associations establish standards for lawyers, ZIMSEC properly determines parameters for A-level certification. These are not restrictions on learning itself (anyone can study whatever they wish) but standards for public credentialing.

The argument that this constitutes assault on freedoms conflates learning with certification. Nobody restricts how many subjects students study or how deeply they engage with content. The restriction applies only to public examination access beyond reasonable parameters. This represents appropriate governance of certification systems, not oppression of individual liberty.

Children occupy a particular sociolegal category requiring additional protections. We restrict many freedoms for minors because we recognise developmental needs and long-term interests that children cannot fully evaluate themselves. We prevent twelve-year-olds from signing contracts, marrying, or working full-time regardless of their capacity. Restrictions on public examinations fall into this category of reasonable developmental protections.

The freedom being restricted is largely parental freedom to push children into accelerated pathways, not the child’s autonomous choice. Presidential spokesperson George Charamba’s anecdote illustrates this clearly. His son tried registering for more than three subjects. Only parental intervention redirected this impulse: “Young man, what do you want to do in life? I want to be a medical doctor. Perfect; which subjects and how many points do you require? Maths, Chemistry and Biology, above 13 points. Perfect, you go and register for those three.”

Charamba notes that his son “might not hit cheap headlines if he does well in those three subjects; but he will enrol into a medical school, hopefully to become a good doctor.”

Just because a child tolerates pressure does not mean imposing it serves their interests. We optimise for points rather than genuine development, creating graduates with impressive credentials but weak analytical foundations. This harm becomes visible only later, when these students face work requiring deep understanding rather than examination recall, when they struggle with abstraction and complex problem-solving, when they discover gaps between certificates and actual intellectual capacity.

When challenged, critics retreat to calls for commissioned studies and evidence-based decision making. This sounds reasonable but misunderstands what evidence we already possess and what policy decisions require.

We should ask, what evidence suggests that twelve subjects produces better educational outcomes than three? We start not from a neutral position requiring studies to determine whether limits are justified, but from a position where substantial evidence already points toward clear policy. International consensus exists, universities worldwide require three A-level subjects because this represents depth sufficient for tertiary preparation. Pedagogical evidence supports depth over breadth. The current situation demonstrably fails basic educational standards.

If we needed evidence-based research to determine optimal subject numbers, why has ZIMSEC been allowing unlimited subjects without any such evidence? The current practice evolved not from pedagogical research but from institutional drift and lack of enforcement.

What would commissioned studies even measure? If we examine examination performance, we already know students can pass twelve subjects, that is not the question. The question is whether passing twelve subjects represents genuine education or examination coaching. If we track university outcomes, this requires longitudinal research spanning years whilst problematic practice continues. Professional competence presents even greater measurement challenges, requiring decades-long career tracking.

Evidence-based policy does not mean infinite delay whilst gathering perfect data. It means drawing on existing research and applying established pedagogical principles. The studies critics propose answer the wrong question. The relevant policy questions are about system design, not optimal subject numbers: Should public examination systems accommodate unlimited individual customisation? Should ZIMSEC create special arrangements consuming resources unequally? Should we allow practices that replace education with examination coaching?

These are policy judgements informed by evidence and principle. They require clarity about what public examination systems are for, not commissioned studies.

Critics with experience supporting exceptional students observe that these children appear “normal” in social presentation, they handle academic loads without obvious distress, interact normally with peers, appear well-adjusted despite exceptional achievement. This supposedly demonstrates that concerns about harm are overblown.

Normality in social presentation does not equal educational soundness. I was probably a “normal kid” too whilst being subjected to this optimisation regime. The damage is not visible in how we interact socially; it becomes visible in how we think. When students reach university, enter professional practice, grapple with genuinely complex problems requiring deep abstraction, gaps become apparent. The breadth-over-depth approach produces people who perform well on structured examinations but struggle with genuine intellectual work.

The counterfactual question matters crucially. Suppose instead of taking eight or ten or twelve A-levels, these students took three and spent equivalent time engaging deeply with those subjects, developing broader capabilities, pursuing genuine interests without examination pressure, and building social and emotional maturity alongside intellectual development. Would they be worse off? I suspect they would be considerably better off, better educated in meaningful senses even if their points total looked less impressive.

What selection effects operate in organisations supporting these students? Presumably they screen for children who can handle pressure, who possess not only intellectual capability but also emotional resilience, family support, and resources. But policy must account for all children, including those whose parents push them into excessive subjects without adequate support structures. A sample of carefully-supported students does not represent the universe of cases that policy must address.

Critics frame this as a matter of individual choice, if students and families want to take twelve subjects, why should government prevent them? This assumes that choices occur in a neutral environment where individuals freely weigh options. The reality differs substantially.

Even without direct coercion, powerful structural incentives push toward excess. Schools market themselves on exceptional results; 56 points generates headlines. Parents compete through children’s achievements; in certain social circles, the number of subjects one’s child takes signals commitment to excellence and family resources. Students face peer pressure; if others take ten subjects, how does one justify taking only three without appearing lazy or unambitious? Cultural narratives equate more with better.

In this environment, the “choice” to take twelve subjects is not freely made. It responds to systemic pressures that make excess appear necessary for success. The ministry’s cap removes these structural pressures by establishing that excellence means depth, not breadth. When everyone operates within the same framework, individual families need not navigate competitive dynamics that push toward excess whilst absolute educational quality declines.

This debate ultimately concerns what we want from public examination systems. The ministry’s cap aligns Zimbabwean practice with international standards, established pedagogical principles, and defensible judgements about what genuine education requires. It protects system integrity against distortion for individual cases, preserves equity by removing options that primarily benefit already-privileged students, redirects focus from credential accumulation to depth of learning, and protects children from adult-driven competitions that substitute performance for education.

The choice is clear, do we want a system that produces graduates credentialed across many subjects but struggling with abstraction and complex thought, or one that develops genuine capability through depth of engagement? Do we want a childhood sacrificed on the altar of credential competitions, or education that serves human flourishing?

The ministry has chosen wisely. This serves students, serves equity, serves system integrity, and serves our collective interest in producing graduates who can reason abstractly and solve complex problems.

That is what public examination systems should accomplish. That is what the ministry’s policy protects.