BECE candidates can’t access admission letters

Candidates of the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) who have gained admission to senior high schools (SHSs) and technical schools are  worried as a result of their inability to print their admission letters on the Internet.

Although they have purchased the Ghana Education Service (GES) scratch cards that should enable them to print the letters on the Internet, they have not been able to do so two weeks after the release of their placements.

According to GES guidelines, each successful candidate is required to access his or her admission form from the Internet using a GES scratch card which was purchased at GH¢4.

Then the candidates are to present the letters to the schools where they have been placed.

The Head of the Public Relations Unit of the GES, Mr Charles Parker-Allotey, explained to the Daily Graphic that a technical problem was making it difficult for parents to print out the admission letters of their children.

Some parents and guardians of the candidates complained to the Daily Graphic in Accra yesterday, saying although first-year students were supposed to report for school on October 15, 2012, they were still not sure as to what was happening.

“Although I have bought the scratch card, I cannot access the Internet. Meanwhile, they say the first years are to report on October 15. When you go to the schools, they also tell you that they have not received the admission lists,” a worried parent, Maame Ama, told the Daily Graphic in Accra.

Another parent, George Adane, said he had purchased the scratch card but had not been able to access the Internet information on his son.

“I have sent a text and seen the school he has been placed in but I don’t know what is happening,” he said, and called on the GES to extend the date for reporting for the first years.

Auntie Esi Amoako also said she had been trying for the past two weeks but had not been successful.

She said she did not know what was happening, adding, “When you go to the school to confirm whether or not your child has been placed in it, you don’t see anything.”

According to Mr Parker-Allotey, although the technical problem was rectified on Wednesday, it occurred again, adding that the GES was working round the clock to get it fixed by the close of yesterday.

He expressed the hope that the problem would be solved and said the October 15 date for first years to report to school remained unchanged.

Mr Parker-Allotey insisted that the placement lists were supposed to be in the schools by now.

The placement of the candidates was released on September 22, 2012.

A total of 375,258 candidates who wrote this year’s BECE qualified for placement into SHSs and technical institutes.

Source: Daily Graphic