PRC: No need to retake nursing exam despite leakage

Despite the leakage controversy, nursing graduates who took last month’s licensure examination don’t have to re-take the exam, the Professional Regulation Commission (PRC) declared yesterday.

"Nobody will have to re-take the exam. The leaked questions were not counted and have been invalidated," PRC Board of Nursing chairwoman Dr. Eufemia Octaviano told The STAR yesterday.

Octaviano assured the invalidation of the questions would not affect the integrity of the entire examination.

"We used statistical and scientific treatment based on core behavior (in counting the grades). We have already solved this," she said.

The PRC formed a fact-finding committee to probe the complaint of 91 examinees in Baguio City that questions were leaked to reviewees of R.A. Gapuz Review Center (RAGRC).

The committee concluded the leakage incident happened and recommended the filing of administrative charges against the two members of the Board of Nursing (BON).

The PRC has forwarded the case to the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) for the criminal prosecution of the those involved.

Octaviano said the leaked questions were included in the test 3 and test 5 of the five-test licensure examination taken last June 11 and 12.

This developed as the RAGRC announced that 27 of its reviewees landed in the top 10 of nursing board exams, including topnotcher Gringo de Guzman San Diego.

" RAGRC found a reprisal against baseless accusations made by the 91 complainants in the person of nursing ace Gringo de Guzman San Diego," the RAGRC said in a statement.

RAGRC said San Diego, a graduate of the University of Pangasinan, reviewed under its branch in Dagupan. RAGRC boasted that its reviewees bagged the third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eight, ninth and tenth spots of the examination.

Meanwhile, NBI Assistant Regional Director Elfren Meneses Jr., chief of the NBI-Anti-Fraud and Computer Crimes Division (AFCCD), has assigned Supervising Agent Martini Cruz and Special Investigator 4 Rodolfo Saniano to probe the leakage incident.

"I gave the two of them copies of the report but we still have to discuss how to attack the problem," Meneses said.

The PRC furnished the NBI-AFCCD with their 300-page summary and a four-page PRC office order.

The order specifically mentioned the names of two examiners — Anesia Dionisio and Virginia Madela — who face administrative charges for alleged "neglect of duty that gave rise to the leakage of test questions."

The document signed by PRC chairperson Leonor Tripon-Rosero, said the two were directed to immediately inhibit themselves from their official functions as board members of the BON. Dionisio and Madela were also asked to take a leave of absence until the administrative charges have been filed against them. — Sheila Crisostomo, Evelyn Macairan