Disbelief, outrage, and rage have been sparked by the widespread failure in the 2025 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE), otherwise known as WAEC. Stakeholders have voiced serious concerns about the subpar performance in different responses.
A pitiful 38.32 percent of the 1,973,365 applicants who took the May/June WAEC 2025 exam earned five credits, including English Language and Mathematics, according to the results that WAEC released yesterday.
Join our WhatsApp community
The implication is that 1,218,820 candidates failed to obtain five credits, including English Language and Mathematics in the just concluded WAEC and therefore may not be able to secure admission into tertiary institutions.
The consistent drop in academic performance on senior secondary school exams, according to Mr. Emmanuel Oji, president of the Association for Formidable Educational Development (AFED), is a wake-up call for a critical reexamination of the country’s educational system as well as a need for a comprehensive review of the current strategy.
“It’s alarming that less than 50 per cent of students achieved the desired passes, raising questions about the effectiveness of our current methods,” he said.
He urged for a reevaluation of the English language’s significance in evaluating knowledge in our cultural context and pointed out that the focus placed on it as a required subject in African education is especially remarkable.
According to Oji, the drop in performance calls for a more thorough examination of a number of issues, such as bad teaching strategies, cramming, a lack of study materials, and inadequate preparation.
Join our WhatsApp community
“I am just being sincere, this is not going to get any better except, we redirect our education system to reflect our economically driven skill, character, nationalism or patriotism. We may be running around the same circle. Our education system calls for an emergency overhaul,” Oji stated.
Similarly, the Proprietor of Royal Academy, Mushin, Lagos, Mrs. Ronke Akintunde, called for a thorough review of the examination to know who to blame. “I am yet to recover from the shock of candidates’ abysmal performance in the exam. I have read the news item on the results three times to be sure of what I am reading. Certainly, the government should ask questions about what happened.”
Elder Sunday Nnamdi, a worried parent, called the outcomes intolerable and demanded that the government and WAEC explain to Nigerians what caused the appalling performance.
He claims that only 38.32% of candidates received five credits in maths and English since the results were announced, which raises concerns.
Join Our Social Media Channels:
WhatsApp: NaijaEyes
Facebook: NaijaEyes
Twitter: NaijaEyes
Instagram: NaijaEyes
TikTok: NaijaEyes
READ THE LATEST EDDUCATION NEWS
