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2021 WASSCE: WAEC concludes arrangements as 1.6m candidates register

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By Gistflash News

July 18, 2021

No fewer than 1.6 million candidates are expected to participate in this year’s West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) scheduled to begin on Aug. 16.

The Head of National Office (HNO) of West African Examination Council (WAEC), Mr Patrick Areghan, gave the figure in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Sunday in Lagos.

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Areghan said that the council was working day and night  toward accommodating some schools still bothering it with late registration.

 

He said that the development was taking its toll on council’s operations.

Areghan said ahead of the conduct of the 2021 WASSCE, the  council was  working with relevant stakeholders to ensure a hitch-free WASSCE for school candidates, in spite of some challenges.

”As I have always said, conducting examination is not a tea party. It is a huge task and requires collaboration of all critical stakeholders, including the media.

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”It requires a lot of preparations and even more, especially in the face of the rising cases of insecurity and the resurgence  of  Coronavirus pandemic in the country.

”In conducting this examination, we also want to ensure that the lives of all those involved, including council’s staff, and materials are properly secure.

”Our arrangement for the successful conduct of our upcoming examination, therefore, is in top gear as we are ensuring that we do not leave any stone unturned,” he said.

Areghan noted that examination conduct required money and other resources.

According to him, the entire process of conducting the examination – from printing of examination materials, distributing them and ensuring security, to recruitment of adhoc staff and printing certificates –  is a huge financial burden.

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Areghan gave the assurance that WAEC would continue to do all it could to stay afloat.

”It is what the council has been doing, and we want to ensure we continue in that excellent tradition.”

 

He noted that West African School Certificate was  internationally accepted and required protection of its integrity.

”Therefore, in order not allow anything reduce that standard, we shall be collaborating with the federal and state ministries of health and education as well as the police and other security agencies.

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”This is in a bid to ensure that all precautionary measures are in place before, during and after the examination,” Areghan said.

The HNO said that WAEC members had been meeting  to fine-tune strategies that would ensure a hitch-free conduct of the examination.

He urged schools and candidates to get themselves well prepared ahead of the examination, warning that the council would not tolerate any acts capable of undermining the integrity of the examination.

”There is no hiding place for cheats.

”We want to warn  schools, students and even supervisors and invigilators that there will be no hiding place for anyone who tries to go against laid down rules for the conduct of this examination.

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”We will surely catch that person, no matter where the malpractice is being carried out.

“We have in-built mechanisms to detect every act of cheating; cheats, when caught, will not get their results.

”Even if you cheat in our objective test, we will catch you, using technology. This technology is called the Item Deferential Profile; it has been there for quite sometime,” he said.

The HNO advised parents not to indulge their children and wards in cheating in  examinations by providing money to source for the questions from fraudsters.

”We have carried out a lot of sensitisation, reaching out to parents not to give money to their children in an attempt to patronise rogue website operators and other mischievous individuals, who promise to help get to WAEC questions for them, before the examination.

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”There is nothing like that. Some even go as far as saying WAEC normally  posts  questions on the internet.

“This is laughable and misleading. We have tried as much as possible to enlighten the world that there is nothing like ‘miracle centre’.

”This is a creation of the society and not the  council.

“It may be existing in their subconscious but does not exist in our dictionary,” he said.

According to him, there has been no episode of leakage of council’s examination questions in Nigeria since the last, many years ago.

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He said that what some sections of the public referred to as leakage during conduct of WASSCE, was the work of internet fraudsters, who registered and sat with genuine candidates in the hall.

”They are served the examination papers, they pretend to be writing the examination, while they manage to snap the questions in collaboration with their mercenaries outside.

”But these days, they no longer snap the questions; rather, they connive with some unscrupulous supervisors and invigilators, who help them to snap the questions, using their own handsets, and send, after which the fraudsters put the questions on the internet.

”These same supervisors allow some candidates into the halls with handsets, even when they know it is against the law, all because they have been compromised.

”However, the various ministries of education have been doing a great job in this respect, as they have been taking drastic measures on those found culpable, by either sacking outrightly or demotion,” he said.

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The HNO warned that WAEC  would not hesitate to hand any suspect over to the police.

”We have a way of detecting those posting these things to the internet and go after them; that is why we always need the collaboration of the police,” Areghan said.

NAN

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Education

SMEDAN introduces Entrepreneurship as a subject to primary, secondary schools

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By Gistflash News

Sept 22, 2021

The Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN) began a capacity building workshop on entrepreneurship for primary and secondary schools teachers in Bayelsa on Wednesday.

Its South-South Coordinator, Mr Egbuna Iloba, said the agency was introducing  entrepreneurship to primary and secondary schools across Nigeria under the National Schools Entrepreneurship Programme known as “Mind Shift’’.

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He represented SMEDAN’s Director-General, Dr Dikko Radda, at the opening of the workshop.

Iloba said that the agency was collaborating with states’ Ministries of Education to prepare teachers to teach entrepreneurship as a subject.

He said inculcating entrepreneurship into schools curricula from the basic level was fundamental to redirecting the mind set of school leavers and graduates from being job seekers to entrepreneurs.

This would enable them to seize available opportunities to solve problems and create jobs, he added.

“Children are expected to unleash their innate wealth-creating potentialities by exploiting opportunities that abound in their respective communities as well as engage themselves in productive economic endeavours while in elementary school.

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“What we are doing at this stage is to enhance the capacity of teachers who will in turn prepare pupils and students and convert them into entrepreneurs.

“In addition, after the training, schools are expected to create entrepreneurship clubs and schools enterprises.

“The clubs will compete for laurels at the regional and national levels where cash prizes will be given to the best three schools that will represent the country at global youth entrepreneurship events outside the country in 2022,’’ Iloba said.

In his remarks, Director in charge of Secondary Education in Bayelsa, Rev. Jacob Osusu, urged teachers to take advantage of the opportunity to pioneer the programme and lay a solid foundation for youths.

He represented Mr Gentle Emela, Bayelsa’s Commissioner for Education at the occasion.

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Osusu also urged teachers to look beyond the immediate benefit of the workshop to embrace entrepreneurship and propagate same to their pupils and students.

He noted that the benefits of the training were life-long and would also prepare them for retirement life after the classroom.

Mr Tiamiu Ibrahim, a SMEDAN resource person at the workshop explained that the curriculum had 12 modules and was developed by the agency and the state’s Ministry of Education which is expected to take the programme to all schools in the state.

Mrs Lilian Kakiri, a participant and Head Teacher at Ebisam Group of Schools, Yenagoa, applauded the policy for involving private and public schools and hoped that it would contribute to tackling youth unemployment.

Also Mr David Singabelle, a teacher at Government Model School, Ekeremor Local Government Area of Bayelsa said the programme was long overdue and would lay a foundation for refocusing the school system beyond issuing certificates.

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The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that100 teachers drawn from private and public schools in the eight local government areas of Bayelsa are participating in the three-day workshop.

NAN

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Education

Zulum wields big stick, suspends Ramat Poly Rector, others

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By Gistflash News

Sept 21, 2021

Gov. Babagana Zulum of Borno has suspended the Rector of Ramat Polytechnic, Dr Modu Kyari and other management staff of the institution.

Zulum wielded the big stick when he paid a surprise visit to the institution on Tuesday in Maiduguri.

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He expressed disappointment with the condition of things in the polytechnic, where he served as  rector from 2011 to 2015.

“As far as I am concerned, this polytechnic is dead, nothing is working.

“The workshops are not in existence, the mechanical workshop is not working, the agricultural workshop is not working, likewise the entrepreneurship centre is not working.

“The school is facing myriads of problems, ranging from lack of funding and commitment.

“As a former student and rector of this polytechnic, I have moral stakes in it and will not allow this institution to rot during my era as Governor of Borno State,” Zulum vowed.

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He directed the Commissioner of Higher Education, Science, Technology and Innovation, Dr Babagana Mallumbe to take over the affairs of the institution for the next six months.

The governor also directed the ministry to put all the workshops and laboratories in the polytechnic back to proper use, as soon as possible.

Zulum further ordered the Ministry of Water Resources to drill two deep boreholes and carry out reticulation of the water to address the dearth of potable water in the institution, to prevent spread of waterborne diseases.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the governor later addressed students of the polytechnic, where he assured that the payment of their scholarship grant would commence soon.

NAN

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Education

Dettol to introduce hygiene education curriculum in Lagos schools

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By Gistflash News

Sept 20, 2021

Dettol Nigeria says it will be introducing hygiene education curriculum in Lagos schools to encourage good hygiene among students and their families.

The General Manager, Reckitt Sub-Saharan Africa, Mr Akbar Ali Shah, made this known in a statement made available to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Monday in Lagos.

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He said that the initiative was part of the 2021 Dettol School Hygiene Education Programme, a Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6 initiative under the Dettol Clean Naija campaign.

Shah said that the campaign was aimed at creating awareness, educating and encouraging primary school students to inculcate hygienic practices in their daily lives.

He said that the Dettol School Hygiene stakeholders’ workshop was held last Thursday to intimate the Lagos State education sector on the 2021 programme vision and implementation.

According to him, the 2021 edition will feature the specially developed Hygiene Curriculum created by the Dettol international team, consisting of comics and worksheets that aims to convey the hygiene message to pupils in a fun and engaging manner.

The general manager said that the programme would also involve impact assessment, using scientific measurement tools to determine the impact of its hygiene education on the students, their teachers and parents.

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He said that Dettol had partnered with the Lagos State office on SDGs, Dean Initiative, World’s Largest Lesson, and Slum and Rural Health Initiative (SRHIN) to help drive the programme implementation and adoption.

“With Dettol, our purpose is to protect life by making good hygiene simple to adopt. Since 2015, we have directly reached over five million primary school children in Nigeria with our hygiene education.

“However, with the need for an intensified hygiene consciousness due to COVID-19, we are evolving from a model where we had just a one-off contact with the students, to one where there would be repeated interactions based on lessons from the hygiene vurriculum.

“Our aim is to emphasise on the need to enable a sanitised environment and to create the importance of water, hygiene and sanitation in preventing the spread of infections amongst children,’’ he said.

Shah commended its partnership with the Lagos State Office on the SDGs, Dean Initiative, World’s Largest Lesson and SRHIN.

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Mr Lekan Fatodu, Senior Special Assistant to the Lagos State Governor on SDG, commended Dettol Nigeria for its efforts to ensure the overall well-being of pupils.

He urged stakeholders and school executives to help ensure the success of the Dettol initiative.

The Chairman, Lagos State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB), Mr Wahab Alawiye-King, said that the state government would collaborate with Dettol Nigeria to ensure workability of the hygiene curriculum.

Alawiye-King said that the Dettol School Hygiene Education Programme would tackle the challenge of making the schools Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH)-friendly.

NAN

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