Gov’t to introduce centralized admissions system for universities

 

By Nana Asare Barimah
The government intends to centralize admissions into public tertiary institutions with the introduction of a placement system.

A 9-member committee in its 2018 Tertiary Education Policy Document proposed the new system among others to the Education Ministry.

The system dubbed the Centralized University Admissions and Placement Service (CAPS) will replace the current stressful and expensive system of applying to different Universities.

The Minister of State, in charge of Tertiary Education, Professor Kwesi Yankah, lauded the proposal last Friday, at a stakeholders meeting held in Koforidua in the Eastern Region.

“One thing that I mentioned was a policy development involving centralized admissions where you don’t have to apply to various universities but you apply to one common platform like they do for the secondary school, and then the administrative or technical vehicle gives you placement,” he said.

He said some officials of the Ministry of Education, Vice Chancellors and Registrars had been to the UK and Nigeria to understudy how the system works in those countries.

Prof. Yankah said the centralized admissions system will be chaired by Prof. Adow Obeng, former Vice Chancellor of University of Cape Coast who currently is the President of Presbyterian University college adding that the inauguration will be formally done on Thursday, January 17, 2019.

The workshop was attended by all 10 Vice Chancellors from Traditional Universities, representation from Technical Universities, Private Universities, Principals of Colleges of Education, regulatory bodies, the reform Secretariat of Ministry of Education, University Teachers Association, Tertiary Education Workers Union and other participants totalling 50.

At the secondary level, students who pass the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) are centrally placed to the various Senior High Schools across the country through the Computerized School Selection and Placement System (CSSPS).

Students usually select some senior high schools they wish to attend, and the computerised system automatically gives them one.

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