Before proceeding further, let me make some clarification here for readers not to be misguided by the topic.
WAEC and NECO which happens to be the common yardstick for the issuance of O’ level certificates to secondary school graduates is a satisfactory trend, but what I sense to be wrong is the period of registration of these examinations and the time interval in which they are being written.
In our secondary schools, WAEC registration and NECO registration do take place simultaneously which I beg to question. Is there any fundamental difference in the nature of the examinations? If there is none, why then are students indirectly coerced to register for both exams at the same time?
We know quite well that WAEC is normally written before NECO, and before the WAEC results is out, you must have written NECO, thus awaiting two different results of similar magnitude! A concept I find so difficult to comprehend. It’s more like needing a car and ordering for two.
At a time when there is dire need to improve the standard of living of Nigerians, it becomes absolutely necessary to x-ray every form of wasteful attitude. WAEC and NECO registration fee no longer comes cheap…
The justification we do tell ourselves back then was this “in case you no sure of one or two paper for WAEC, you fit make am for NECO, and the one wey you no make for NECO, you fit make for WAEC…” I tell you most solemnly, this school of thought simply conditions the mind to nurture mediocrity, or better still to accepting failure. Assuming this school of thought holds water, what then happens to those who pass both exams flawlessly? Remember they’ll need only one.
What I am insinuating in essence is that these examinations should be properly spaced; i.e. if a candidate registers for WAEC, the exam should be written and the results published before the commencement of the NECO registration or vice versa. A student who after sitting for his/her mock examinations and JAMB should be adequately equipped to pass either WAEC or NECO in a sitting.
Having a result you will never make use of is a waste of financial resources.
