'There is no fight over limited spaces' — GES assures on SHS placement

The Ghana Education Service (GES) has dismissed concerns that there are insufficient spaces in senior high schools to accommodate students who qualify for placement under the Computerised School Selection and Placement System (CSSPS). Head of the Public Relations Unit of the GES, Daniel Fenyi, says the country currently has about 800,000 available class vacancies in senior high schools, against approximately 637,328 candidates who qualify for placement. Speaking on Joy FM's Newsnight on Monday, September 9, he explained that while 87.3% of the qualified candidates, representing 527,932 students, have already been automatically placed, those who were not placed have the option to use the ongoing self-placement process. 'Any individual that will create for you a picture or an image that suggests that there is a fight over limited spaces is not telling you the true picture. At the moment, the Ghana Education Service has 800,000 class vacancies in the schools, and the children we are looking at are just about 600,000.' According to him, the challenge is largely driven by the high demand for a limited number of Category A schools. He disclosed that more than 318,000 candidates have expressed interest in Category A schools, even though only about 76,000 vacancies are available across the approximately 94 to 95 Category A institutions. Mr Fenyi therefore explained that not every student who qualifies for placement can be accommodated in a Category A school, regardless of their academic performance. He stressed, however, that this does not mean such students are being denied access to senior high school education. 'Every single individual or student who sat for the BECE can be placed, and even after that, we also have 200,000 class vacancies in the schools,' he said. The GES official further explained that the placement system does not rely solely on students' aggregate scores. He said the system considers a range of factors, including candidates' raw scores, their preferred residential status and the competitiveness of the programmes they select. Mr Fenyi noted that a student with a higher aggregate could, in some instances, have a better raw score than another student with a lower aggregate, making raw scores an important consideration in ranking candidates. Residential choices also influence placement, he said, with students opting for day programmes potentially having an advantage because they do not require the limited boarding facilities of schools. He added that the competitiveness of programmes also affects placement outcomes, noting that a science programme at a highly sought-after school could attract significantly more competition than a less subscribed programme at the same institution.