BY DAYO ADESULU
The West African Examinations Council (WAEC) has fixed the date for the Commencement of the 2023 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) for School Candidates.
It’s Head of National Office, Nigeria, Mr Patrick Areghan on Thursday in Lagos said that 2023 WASSCE will take place between Monday, the 8th of May and Friday, the 23rd of June, 2023 in Nigeria.
He pointed out that for the second time in succession, WAEC has successfully reverted to May/June period for the conduct of the examination.
According to him, the significance of this landmark is that the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) and the various member States, with the exception of Ghana, have now again found a common ground in respect of their academic calendars.
Areghan said: “This shows a massive recovery from the devastating effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic. “Our sincere gratitude goes to the Honourable Minister of Education and his Ministry for this memorable achievement, and to the Registrar to Council for his untiring efforts.
“The examination in focus is the School Candidates diet of the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE), meant for the regular exit-class (SS3) students in all approved government and private secondary schools in the country.
“A total of One Million, Six Hundred and Twenty-one Thousand, Eight Hundred and Fifty-three (1,621,853) candidates from Twenty Thousand, Eight Hundred and Fifty-one, (20,851) secondary schools have registered for the examination.
“Out of this number, Seven Hundred and Ninety-eight Thousand, Eight Hundred and Ten (798,810) are males, amounting to 49.25%, while Eight Hundred and Twenty-three Thousand, and Forty-three (823,043) are females, which is 50.75% of the total candidature.
“The statistics shows that there is a further increase and decrease in the number of females and males respectively, compared to the 2022 diet. On the whole, the candidature for the 2023 WASSCE (SC) increased by 13, 868 over the figure of 2022 (1,607,985).
“Candidates would be examined in 76 subjects, made up of 197 papers. About 30,000 practicing senior secondary school teachers, nominated by the various State Ministries of Education, would be participating in the examination as supervisors.
“Teachers in all the schools presenting candidates for the examination would serve as invigilators in their respective schools.
“Supervisors and invigilators for derecognized schools would be solely appointed, from outside the schools, by the State Ministries of Education concerned.
“The Council has established a self-service system for candidates, through the CHATBOT Platform, to enable them access their entries, which in most cases, the schools do not allow them to see, contrary to instructions.
“The Candidate Self-Service is a service on the Request Management System/Chatbot (https://request.waec.ng) which allows students to confirm data uploaded for them by schools in order to make necessary corrections (if any) on such data.
“It provides two key services on the Request Management System which include Confirmation of Entry/Registration and Confirmation of Continuous Assessment Score (CASS).
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“The justification for the Candidate Self-Service is as follows:
incessant mistakes made by schools during CASS capturing and candidates registration. /
“These errors were mostly not communicated to the candidates until the release of result;
large number of queries after the release of results which eventually delays the printing of affected candidates’ certificates.
“Also, this accounts for high rate of amendments after certificates are printed;
the generation of clean candidates’ data during the conduct of WASSCE for School Candidates and processing of results, which includes CASS and Registration/Entries information;
making error identification and correction easy for candidates and all stakeholders;
Candidates will derive a lot of benefits by making use of this platform:
candidates can access their CASS and Entry information seamlessly;
candidates can validate entry data using the CASS Reference number or Examination Number;
easy identification of errors before, during and after he conduct of examinations;
timely placement of request for correction of errors;
ability to track correction on Candidates’ data (Entry registration and CASS) from the Request Management System/ChatBot;
elimination of amendment on certificate and also avoid additional cost for such amendment.”