Mark Sasu Mensah, the National Coordinator for the Computerised School Selection and Placement System (CSSPS), has assured that sufficient school places are available for all students who completed this year’s Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE).
Speaking on the Asaase Breakfast Show (ABS) on August 30, Mensah addressed concerns regarding school placements, noting that while ample spaces exist, the distribution could be more balanced due to high demand for specific schools.
Mensah explained that about 60% of BECE candidates typically select top-tier schools, which creates a bottleneck and leaves other schools with available spots.
“Every year, the number of available spaces exceeds the number of students who take the BECE.
However, the challenge is that the demand is significantly higher for Category A schools, while many schools face low demand,” he said.
CSSPS has introduced an additional five school choices for students this year to address this imbalance.
The initiative aims to improve the placement rate to 90%. “We have observed that despite the availability of many schools, some students do not secure placements in any of their top six choices due to their performance or limited spaces in their preferred schools,” Mensah noted.
He further explained that the additional five choices are intended to ensure that students who do not secure placement in their top six choices will still have a higher chance of being placed in one of these alternative schools, provided there are available spaces.
