Available data from the West African Examination Council (WAEC) from 2016 to 2021 show a significant increase in rates of pass marks in the West Africa Senior Secondary Certificate Examination since the inception of the Free Senior High School policy.
Prior to the rollout of the Free SHS, critics of the policy, especially the opposition NDC, raised fears that making secondary education free would compromise the quality of secondary education, and affect the overall performance of students.
But a five-year data by WAEC, from 2016 to 2021, shows that performance has generally improved under Free SHS, compared to the last two examination data of non-Free SHS in 2015 and 2016 respectively.
A comparative subject-to-subject analysis of the last two years’ WAEC examination before Free SHS, that is 2015 and 2016, and the two years of results of Free SHS graduates in 2020 and 2021, show a big leap in passing rates.
CANCELLATION OF PAPERS
The WAEC data also shows that mass cancellation of subjects of entire examination of some students has been a regular feature of the WASSCE for many years now.
This reality defeats the claim that the high rate of passing in the past two years under Free SHS may have been due to leakages of paper.
Prior to Free SHS in 2017, examination papers were leaked and subsequently cancelled, yet the rate of passing was lower than what has been recorded in the past two years.
Below is a breakdown of the yearly passing rate in every elective and core subjects in 2015 and 2016, as well as in 2020 and 2021 under Free SHS.
2015 WACSSE Performance
In 2015, only 25.29% of candidates who took the May/June WASSCE obtained A1-C6 in Mathematics while 29.75% had D7-E8 and 37.17% had F9.
In Integrated Science, 23.63% obtained A1-C6 while 39.19% got D7-E8 and 37.17% obtaining F9.
For the English Language, 50.29% of the candidates obtained A1-C6 while 30.68% obtained D7-E8 and 19.02% had F9.
Social Studies, 51.84% obtained A1-C6 and 25.20% got D7-E8 while 22.94 had F9.
*119 Results of schools were withheld while investigations into alleged mass cheating in the objective test were identified with the aid of new anti-malpractice software. Again, 4-3 candidates had their entire results cancelled for examination malpractices while 1,859 and 8 candidates had their subject and entered results cancelled respectively.
2016 WACSSE Performance
For Mathematics, 77,108 (32.83%) obtained A1-C6; 65,007 (27.68%) obtained D7-E8 whilst 89,477 (38.10%) had F9.
About 113,933 students obtained A1-C6 in Integrated Science which is 48.48%, 75,938 (32.32%) obtained D7-E8 whilst 42,519 (18.09%) had F9.
A total of 125,065 students obtained A1 to C6 in English Language, which is 53.19%, 59,725 (25.40%) obtained D7-E8 whilst 46,595 (19.82%) had F9.
In the 2016 examinations, 1,576 candidates had their subjects results cancelled; 598 candidates had their entire results cancelled; 13 candidates had their entire results cancelled and were barred from taking any of the Council’s examinations for two years mainly for impersonation during the examination.
In 2017 Reports of widespread leakages in the examinations compelled WAEC to tighten its security measures. At least three papers according to WAEC were “compromised,” but the council did not cancel any of the papers when the issue emanated.
2020 & 2021 WACSSE Performance
In 2020, 57.34% candidates got A1-C6 while 54.08% got same in 2021, English Language. A decline of about 3%.
For Mathematics, 65.71% had A1-C6 in 2020 and 54.11% in 2021. A decline of about 11%.
There was an improvement in Integrated Science as the 52.53% in 2020 moved to 65.70% in 2021. An increase of 13%.
Social Studies also saw a marginal increase from 64.31% in 2020 to 66.03%.
