Gov’t to introduce a National Standardised Test for ‘BECE’ students
The Minister of Education, Haruna Iddrisu says discussions are ongoing for the National Standardized Test (NST) to be conducted for final-year Junior High School students before they write the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE).
Speaking at a public forum, the Education Minister indicated that the new initiative to be introduced by the central government is designed to help students prepare for the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE).
The National Standardised Test to mentally and academically prepare students for the challenges of the BECE and other national exams Haruna Iddrisu said will be administered to students in Class 2, Class 4, Class 6, and JHS 2.
“I am also happy to announce that a National Standardized Test (NST) will be introduced in Ghana to P2, P4, P6 and JSS2. And the intention is simple
You don’t want to tell the child that the only time he is asked to write exams is to prepare for BECE and get ready for BECE when the child has never gone through even the psychological environment of an examination room.
Therefore, we intend to introduce the NST, a national standardised test, which will introduce children to prepare for the world of an examination,” the Minister in Charge of Education told stakeholders at the public forum.
In other news, the former Public Relations Officer for the Ministry of Education, Kwasi Kwarteng has said any attempt by the National Democratic Congress government to present the Standardised Test as a new initiative is misleading and dishonest.
In a Facebook post sighted by Pretertiary.com, he said the National Standardised Test was introduced and first implemented in 2021 under the erstwhile Akufo-Addo New Patriotic Party government with three nationwide assessments conducted so far.
“On December 17, 2021, the first National Standardised Test (NST) was administered to Primary 4 students, with 470,768 pupils from 15,391 schools participating.
Subsequently in 2022, the second National Standardised Test (NST) assessed over 1.5 million pupils from Primary 4 and Primary 2 in public and selected private schools nationwide.
In July 2024, the third National Standardised Test (NST) was conducted for 895,685 students at both Primary 4 and Primary 6 levels.
Given these facts, any attempt to present the NST as a new initiative of the current government is misleading. Governance is a continuous process, and there is nothing wrong with acknowledging the history of policies and giving credit where it is due,” Kwasi Kwarteng said in the Facebook post.
