EDITORIAL — Only a retake will clear the June '06 Nursing exams

We told you so! Sometime last year, the paper ran an editorial which gave a warning that because of the alleged cheating on the June 2006 Nursing Board Exams, there may be some prospective employers who would doubt the credibility of the examinations and not hire those who took the exam.

In less than six months, the warning proved to be true when the Commission on Graduates of Foreign Nursing Schools or CGFNS of the United States decided not to issue VisaScreen certificates to the takers and even the passers of the June 2006 exam.

Those who lobbied for the issuance of licenses to those who passed the controversial exam may have won here in the country. The board passers may have gotten their licenses, yes. But what can these Philippine-issued licenses do when a superpower like the US says it doubts the credibility of the exams that these board passers took and ban these nurses from working there?

If the Philippines just tolerated an exam tainted with cheating and proceeded to issue licenses to those who took the exam, we cannot expect other countries to also do the same, and, just like a popular saying here, charge the whole thing to experience.

It won't be a surprise if other countries like the UK, Australia and Japan, where we send our nurses to, would follow what the CGFNS has done and also ban the June 2006 Nursing board takers from working in their hospitals unless these nurses retake the board exam.

The Philippine Regulation Commission and some nursing groups plan to go to the US to appeal the CGFNS decision. But their plan is just a waste of time because the CGFNS, in its latest statement posted on their website, says it won't entertain appeals and that if the takers of the June 2006 exams really want to work in the US, then they better take the exams again.

We hope those who really fought so hard that the Philippine government issues licenses to those who took the June 2006 Nursing Board exams, despite the controversy hounding it, have other ideas to convince the CGFNS to lift its ban. Otherwise those who took the tainted exam may just as well take the offer of the government for a free voluntary retake. Well, that is if they really want to once and for all get rid of doubts and work in the US, or other country for that matter without the stigma of being branded as one of the takers of a controversy-laden exam.

Unless someone from those who took the exam comes out and openly admits that his or her group was responsible for the cheating that took place during the exam, a retake and only a retake will clear those who took the June 2006 Nursing Board exam.