2016 WASSCE results better than previous years - Prof. Opoku Agyemang

The Education Minister, Prof. Jane Naana Opoku Agyemang says the results released by for the 2016 West Africa Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) is better than previous years, but still not encouraging.

According to her, in analyzing the results, one needs to place it in context and do proper assessment to find out if we are improving or not.

She explained that, there is a slight improvement of the results released last year to that of this year but was quick to add that, it can be improved.

Speaking in an interview with Kwame Tutu on Frontline on Rainbow Radio 87.5FM, she said, ''the performance of students writing the West Africa Senior Secondary School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) seems not encouraging but the results are slightly better than last year's.''

According to WAEC, 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.

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.

About 1,576 candidates had some of their subjects results cancelled, while 598 candidates had their entire results cancelled.

Some educationists, the various teacher unions have expressed their displeasure at the results, describing it as terrible.

But responding to the claims, the sector minister said, we may not necessarily achieve our targets, however efforts must always be implemented to get it to be better.

She said, interventions adopted by government following the results released in 2013 and 2014 have yielded very good results despite the challenges.

Government she stressed worked tirelessly to ensure that students performed better in their core subjects and can confidently state that, it has improved although she agreed more needs to done.

Prof. Jane Naana Opoku Agyemang indicated that, it is needless for blame games and condemnations, rather, all stakeholders, including teachers, students and government to work had and improve upon the results.

''Comparing last year's results and that of this year, i will say we've made some improvements and so we need to improve upon that. The blame game will not solve the problem. Every stakeholder including government, teachers and students alike have a duty to ensure that the situation is improved upon.''