The Computerised Schools Selection and Placement System (CSSPS) has adopted new measures aimed at improving on the placement of Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) candidates in senior high schools (SHSs) and technical institutes (TIs).
The secretariat would now indicate the actual marks of candidates in the various subjects with their corresponding total raw scores, as well as emboss their photographs on the placement forms.
In addition, there will be QR Codes (a machine-readable optical label containing information) bearing other details of candidates on the forms.
The outgoing National Coordinator of the CSSPS, Mr George Atta Boateng, who made this known to the Junior Graphic, noted that “the system is ready so we just have to activate it”.
According to him, the initiative being adopted by the CSSPS secretariat was, among other things, aimed at addressing the situation where fake CSSPS placement forms were issued to prospective candidates.
“Most of the time, people fake our placement forms. Somebody took a placement form to Wesley Girls’ High School and the raw score on it was 512, meanwhile, the highest raw score in the country was 498, so where did that score come from?” he queried.
The new measures, Mr Atta Boateng said, were recommendations by the Ministry of Education and the Ghana Education Service (GES) Council and the Technical Working Committee of the CSSPS, adding that he was very confident of the implementation of the new measures for BECE candidates entering SHSs and TIs this year.
The inclusion of the raw scores on the placement forms, he said, was to address arguments over the grades a candidate got.
For instance, Grade One could range between 75 and 100 marks so a candidate who scored between 75 and 80 gets Grade One but a candidate who scored 85, 90 or 95 marks would be placed ahead of the other candidate when they are competing for space in the same school, he explained.
Meanwhile, candidates who wrote this year’s BECE will have the opportunity to confirm the SHSs and TIs they have chosen for placement with effect from next month.
This, they will do by texting to the short code 1060 on any mobile phone network.
The move is to ensure that the schools chosen by the candidates are correct in order to avoid mistakes.
“Students will be able to text and find out the schools they chose themselves before placement starts. We delayed a little bit because of what happened with the BECE, so it affected us. Hopefully by the first week in August, students should be able to text and confirm the schools they have chosen,” Mr Atta Boateng explained.
A total of 438,030 candidates from 13,434 public and private junior high schools wrote this year’s BECE.
The candidates represent an increase of 15,084 over last year’s figure of 422,946.
