WASSCE results withheld for 22,014 candidates

The results of 22,014 candidates who sat this year's May/June West Africa Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) are being withheld for investigations to proceed on cases of examination malpractice and the registration of unqualified students.

Additionally, 733 candidates have some of their subject results cancelled, while 153 have their entire results cancelled.

Addressing a press conference in Accra Thursday, the Head of the Ghana National Office of the West African Examinations Council (WAEC), Mrs Patience Ayesu, said the malpractices which necessitated the action were facilitated by some teachers and invigilators in some schools.

She named the schools where the teachers facilitated examination ma1practice as St Monica's Senior High School, Mampong-Ashanti, Atweaman Senior High School, Akim Manso, Amaniampong Senior High School, Mampong-Ashanti, Konado Yiadom Senior High School, Asamang-Ashanti, New Edubiase Senior High School, Methodist Senior High/Technical School, Berekum, Badu Senior High/Technical School, Badu-Wenchi, and Ghana Senior High School, Tamale.

According to her, the council would make the names of the teachers involved available to the Ghana Education Service (GES) for disciplinary action to be taken against them.

She said it was also discovered that some heads of schools registered candidates who were not their bona fide students and that this year 203 of such candidates were registered by six heads of schools.

She gave the names of the schools as Atweaman Senior High School, Akim Manso, Senya Senior High School, Senya Bereku, Amaniampong Senior High School, Mampong-Ashanti, Badu Senior High/Technical School, Badu-Wenchi, Avatime Senior High School, Avatime, and Gyamfi Kumanini Senior High/Technical School, Wamahinso.

In all, the results of 135,987 out of the 158,001 candidates who wrote the examination have been released.

Mrs Ayesu said the council was in the process of dispatching the results of the candidates to their schools, adding that "candidates can also access their results online".

"Appropriate penalties have been imposed on candidates who indulged in any form of malpractice during the examination. The details will be published in due course," she said, explaining that "the council has procedures to ensure that assessment of candidates is valid and reliable and that extraneous circumstances do not affect candidates' performance in any of its examinations - BECE, WASSCE and the G/ABCE".

Mrs Ayesu, in response to a question as to why the council did not publish the raw scores of BECE candidates, said it could do so only after a technical meeting with the GES agreed for that to be done.

She said WAEC was a facilitator for the GES and that if the service decided on that, the council would implement it.

On examination leaks, she said, "Since 2005, no leaks have occurred in any of our examinations."

The Head of the Test Administration Division of the council, Mr Kweku Nyamekye Aidoo, said there was no failure in the BECE and that 64 per cent of the candidates had between aggregate six and 30 this year.