WAEC to track exam papers with QR codes

The West African Examination Council (WAEC) has announced its intention to embed QR codes into all examination papers.

This is to curb examination malpractices that mostly springs their head up during Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) and West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE), Chairman of the West African Examination Council, Professor Ato Essuman has said.

He noted that this new technology adopted by its outfit was to track and arrest persons who run copies of the 'original' papers.

WAEC on the other hand will receive an alert through its server when the examination papers are duplicated.

“We have a new innovation now, that will track the question papers through the QR code. Whenever anyone tries running copies of a question paper, we will be alerted through our server. Each question paper will have a unique code, linked to a candidate’s index number and identification number. We can thus trace the perpetrators,” he told Citi News during the 69th Annual Council meeting held in Accra.

It would be recalled that some 2,383 WASSCE candidates had their results cancelled because of examination malpractices.

480 candidates had their results annulled for entering the examination hall with mobile phones.

For those (380 students) who had their results withheld, it was attributed to their engagement in all forms of examination malpractice.