‘It’s a troubling development’ – Patrick Awuah on WASSCE 2020 scandals

Founder and president of Ashesi University, Patrick Awuah, has described as troubling, the recent thread of attacks and rioting of students who began their WASSCE examination earlier this month.

He said the recorded cases depict the distasteful issues in the country’s educational system which must be addressed.

It would be recalled that some WASSCE candidates in separate instances took unconventional ways to protest the strict mode of invigilation during their first written paper to the extent on harming invigilators and a journalist in the process.

Identified students were subsequently sanctioned by the Ghana Education Service.

But according to the educationist, this does not solve the issue at hand. He believes the Ghanaian education system does not have enough content around ethics and integrity in society thus the increasing trend of indiscipline in recent times.

Mr Awuah said “…This year we had an instance where students rioted because…they wanted the invigilator out so they could cheat. Obviously this is very troubling development…Those students almost seem to feel that it is their right to be able to cheat. It is a profoundly troubling statement coming from young people. In any society you’d actually expect the youth to be the most idealistic people. To see this Sinicism, everyone should wake up to see that we have a problem in the educational system...”

In an attempt to further give reasons to why the country is witnessing such intense cases of examination malpractices and its related fallouts, Patrick Awuah noted that the “high stake” notion attached to the BECE and WASSCE is partially to blame.

“Part of the reason is these are very high stake exams, if you fail this exam, your entire academic trajectory is truncated or cut short…The educational system is not focused enough on why ethic is important, why integrity is important.”

Revisiting some encounters he’s had with his students on related issues at Ashesi University, he said some of his students have confessed to cheating in their BECE examinations and the roles their teachers played in that.

“I’ve had students in Ashesi who have told me that their teachers encouraged them to cheat in BECE and their teachers help them cheat," he said.