‘Allow SHS to admit their own students, who said they were admitting chaff’ – Former GIMPA Rector

Professor Philip Ebow Bondzi-Simpson, a former Rector of the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA), has made a strong case for Senior High Schools to admit their own students instead of computerised placements.

He questioned why school authorities at all levels of education admitted their own students, but admission to Senior High School had been subjected to computer algorithms at the expense of various stakeholders.

Speaking at the maiden edition of the annual ‘Dwen Hwe Kan’ conference of the Mfantsipim School over the weekend, he insisted that secondary schools could admit their own students and should, therefore, be given the room to do so.

In his view, the Dean of the Faculty of Law at the University of Cape Coast (UCC), the much-talked-about Computerized School Selection and Placement System (CSSPS), was an unproductive venture that needed to be evaluated.

The CSSPS was introduced in September 2005 as a replacement for the manual admission system done by authorities of respective Senior High, Technical and Vocational institutions as a way of ensuring transparency, equity and efficiency in the process.

But Professor Bondzi-Simpson questioned the credibility of the system since it was being operated by human beings, insisting that it was not working.

He queried if the computer was being fed with information that was beyond reproach and wondered why it was only secondary schools that needed computer placement, saying it was time to evaluate it.

He advocated for schools to be allowed, within a certain framework, the majority of the course, on merit to select students for admission, leaving a place for old students, the Church, children of staff and a small portion for protocol.”

“Who said when the school authorities were admitting their own students, they were admitting chaff, and who said when computer admits them, they are necessarily admitting geniuses?” he quizzed.

Professor Bondzi-Simpson’s comments were on the back of challenges that have characterised recent CSSPS placements.

In all 367, 811 candidates out of the 555,353 who qualified for placement were automatically placed into schools and training institutions of their choice.

The remaining 187, 542 qualified candidates were directed to do self-placement to available schools.

The students are expected to report to their respective schools on Monday, April 4, 2022, barring any unforeseen changes.