MONROVIA, Montserrado – The Liberia office of the West African Examinations Council has released the results of its 2017 senior and junior high school certificate examinations.
According to WAEC’s Liberia office, 31,009 candidates from 554 schools took the senior high exam. Of the number of candidates who sat for the exam, 17,981 candidates made a successful pass, representing 58 percent. Meanwhile, 39 percent of test takers failed. Last year, only 40 percent passed, representing an improvement.
The results for 66 candidates are currently being withheld for malpractices during the examination. Another 826 candidates’ results from five schools are also withheld due to their schools’ indebtedness to the council’s office.
No candidate scored well enough to qualify for the first division classification in the senior high category.
However, 16 candidates, comprising 6 males and 10 females, placed in division two. A female even took the top spot, with Marklyn Winger of the Carver Mission School in Paynesville, Montserrado coming out as the best performing candidate. She had an aggregated T-Score of 715.70.
Despite females being among the best performers, only 46 percent of test takers were females. This is unsurprising, as the Ministry of Education’s Education Sector Analysis notes that “girls account for 47 percent of secondary school students and women account for less than 10 percent of the teaching force.â€
Only 108 or 19 percent of all schools saw all their students successfully pass, although that number was much higher than the 35 schools with a 100 percent pass rate last year.
Information released by the exams office also indicates that there were more private schools sending candidates to the exam in the senior high category.
At the junior high school level, 39,906 candidates from 264 schools took the exam, with 64 percent passing.
Darius Gbaa of the St. Peter Claver High School in Grand Bassa was identified as the best performing candidate. He scored an aggregated T-Score of 322.91, according to the WAEC office.
