In addition to the <el-ignored> tag in your DD (web.xml), please also check isELIgnored atrribute of page directive. That has to be false.
You don't need the el-ignored tag, nor the isELIgnored attribute. So if they exist, remove them.
Or the version of the JSP you are having is less than 2.1, as prior to version 2.1 EL were not supported for jsp.
This exam is about JSP2.0