University Entrance Exam To Replace WASSCE Under New Education Reform

The days of WASSCE as the yardstick for determining who gets admitted into the university in Ghana will soon be replaced by the University Entrance Exam. The information has been sighted by GhanaEducation in a Tweet.

Entry into tertiary education from SHS is covered in Summary 9 and 10 of the New Education Reforms Outline by the Ministry of Education, Ghana Education Service, and the National Council for Curriculum Assessment.

The Summary 9 of the reform reads “WASSCE will be replaced by a University entrance exam at SHS3.” Summary 10 adds that “Students after successful completion of SHS 3 will be awarded a Diploma Certificate instead of WASSCE Certificate”

The question that has been asked on social media after the above information resurfaced this week is that “Will the newly proposed reforms benefit Ghana’s tertiary education sector?”

There have been several efforts by the government to introduce new and dynamic reforms into the country’s education sector. Some of these newly introduced strategic options include STEM programs and STEM Schools, a New curriculum for Pre Secondary and Secondary Schools that commence in 2019 without the relevant textbooks for both teachers and learners.

In recent times, there have been indications that admissions into Colleges of Education (CoE) Colleges will be done through an entrance examination. A cross-section of Ghanaians have argued that the decision is in the right direction. Others have argued that this decision will help ensure the right students enter the CoE. The WASSCE results have to some extent lost credibility due to the rampant annual leakages that have characterized the conduct of the examination.

The question worth answering is will the introduction of the University Entrance Exam To Replace WASSCE lead to the needed efficiency and credibility of the outcomes? Will WAEC be the same institution administering the said examination or the entrance examination will be administered by the respective universities?

Maintaining the WASSCE and introducing a second layer of qualification into universities using university entrance examinations will help improve efficiency and quality.

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There are more questions than answers.

Find below an excerpt of the government’s New Education Reforms Outline