THE school principal told The Straits Times yesterday she was merely trying to give her girls a 'wake-up call' when she spoke to them on the first day of school.

She confirmed that she had used an overhead projector to display the girls' results, but that it was to impress on them that they would have to work hard to qualify for a place in the polytechnics.

She said: 'It's a fact. If a student scored a Grade 4 or 5 for a subject in the N levels, she is unlikely to pass the subject in the O levels.'

N-level subjects are graded from 1 to 5, with 1 being the best grade.

The principal added: 'Some...who don't qualify for poly will end up in the ITE anyway, so they might as well go direct to the ITE.'

She confirmed that she told the girls she wanted 100 per cent passes in her school, but that what she meant was that she wanted all her girls to do well in the O levels - not that she did not want poor performers to tar the school's record or lower its ranking.

Noting that well over 80 per cent of her Normal stream students who sat for the O levels last year did well enough to qualify for the polytechnics, she added: 'But it takes a lot of hard work and the girls needed to know that.'

When given the principal's side of the story, two of the parents interviewed said that if all she wanted was to give the girls a wake-up call, she could have done it differently.

One parent said: 'I would have preferred it if she had called the parents in and given them the hard facts, instead of destroying the confidence of the girls.'