UPDATED: 65.24% of WASSCE candidates score five credits in Maths, English, others

The West African Examination Council has released the 2020 West African Senior Secondary School Certificate Examination (WASSCE).

The council’s Head of National Office, Patrick Areghan, made the announcement in Lagos on Monday.

According to him, 1,003,668 candidates, representing 65.24 percent, obtained credits and above in a minimum of five (5) subjects, including English Language and Mathematics.

“Out of the total number of candidates that sat the examination, one million four hundred and fifty-six thousand seven hundred and twenty-seven (1,456,727) candidates, representing 94.69 per cent have their results fully processed and released,” he said.

Comparing the percentage of the candidates who had five credits including Mathematics and English in 2020 WASSCE to 2019 WASSCE, Mr Areghan said the percentage of candidates who had five credits, including in maths and English in 2019, was 64.18 per cent.

”Thus, there is a marginal 1.06 per cent improvement in performance in this regard,” he said.

He said 1,338,348 candidates, representing 86.99 percent, obtained credit and above in a minimum of any five subjects ‘with or without English Language and/ or Mathematics’.

Mr Areghan also said 81,718 candidates, representing 5.31 per cent, have a few of their subjects still being processed due to some errors on the part of the candidates.

“Efforts are, however, being made to speedily complete the processing to enable all the affected candidates to get their results fully processed and released, subsequently,” he said.

He said results of 215,149 candidates, representing 13.98 per cent of the total number of candidates that sat for the examination, are withheld in connection with various reported cases of examination malpractice.

“The cases are being investigated and reports of the investigations will be presented to the appropriate Committee of the Council for determination in due course. The Committee’s decisions will be communicated to the affected candidates through their various schools,” he said.

Further Breakdown

Giving a breakdown of the statistics, Mr Areghan said 1,549,740 candidates registered for the examination from 19,129 recognised secondary schools in Nigeria.

“Of the number that registered for the examination, 1,538,445 candidates sat the examination,” he said.

The council also said the examination was administered to candidates from some schools in Benin Republic, Cote d’Ivoire and Equatorial Guinea where the Nigeria curriculum for Senior Secondary School is being used.

“Remarkably, the examination was also conducted in Chibok Local Government Area of Borno State, the first time since the abduction of over 200 schoolgirls in the area by insurgents, six years ago,” he said.

Special needs candidates

Mr Areghan said 4,280 candidates with Special Needs were registered for the examination.

“Out of this number, 230 were visually challenged, 745 had impaired hearing; 2,852 had a low vision; 38 were spastic cum mentally challenged, and 58 were physically challenged,” he said.

He said candidates with special needs were adequately provided for in the administration of the examination and their results have been processed and released along with those of other candidates.

Gender

He said out of the 1, 538,445 candidates that sat the examination, 780,660 were males while 757,785 were females, “representing 50.74 percent and 49.26 percent respectively.”

Results

He advised candidates who wrote the examination and fulfilled their financial obligations to the council to access their performance on the council’s results website: www.waecdirect.org.

“The Result Checker PIN and Serial Number required by candidates to check their results online are contained on the Candidate’s Smart Identity Card used during the conduct of the examination.

He said certificates of candidates whose results have been fully processed and released will be ready within the next 90 days, counting from today,” he said.

The West African Examinations Council (WAEC) is an examination board established by law to conduct the examination and award certificates of comparable standard to those of similar examining authorities globally.