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The West African Examination Council (WAEC)
says it is not considering adopting a Computer-
Based Test (CBT) mode for its examinations.
Its Head, National Office, Mr Charles Eguridu,
made the clarification at an interactive forum with
the Education Correspondents on Thursday night in
Abuja.
Eguridu said it would amount to “intellectual
dishonesty’’ for him to say that the council would
introduce CBT in the next five years or the near
future.
According to him, the purpose of education is to
prepare people for life, not to pa$$ examinations;
hence the need to examine different domains
which CBT cannot accommodate.
“There is what we call the cognitive domain; that
is what you have learnt that you can put in your
head.
“There is also what we call affective domain that
has to do with your emotions.
“There is also what we call the psychomotor
domain that is skills which you can express using
your hands and your body.
“I am yet to see any education expert who will
tell you that you can measure the psychomotor
domain using CBT.
“Any test that will use computer to evaluate who
will be a good carpenter cannot be a valid test.’’
He said the examinations conducted by the council
took into cognizance the three domains that
measured ability to recall, apply and practicalise.
Eguridu said that in psychomotor domain,
candidates did practical tests in agricultural
science in the farm and the examiner supervised
their actual agricultural practice.
He said that those doing woodwork were made to
carry out physical designs of whatever woodwork a
$$ignment they were going to do and evaluated on
the outcome of their work.
The WAEC official said that even Netherlands
where people went to learn CBT had yet to apply
CBT in all its examinations.
He said, “In Netherlands which people emulate in
CBT, they have not been able to migrate 40 per
cent.
“How many schools in Nigeria have hardware?
How many schools in Nigeria have the facilities
to have those computers?
“There is the additional problem of electricity
and internet connectivity.
“What JAMB is doing is commendable because
theirs is an admission test; it is a certification
examination.’’
Eguridu said that WAEC was using specialised
gadgets in detecting examination malpractice as
the device had ability to transmit any irregularity
to its data base in Lagos.
He said that the council had started encrypting the
data of candidates in their results to avoid
falsification.
According to him, WAEC has not had any issue of
examination leakages in the past five years.
The WAEC chief also said that the council had
reversed itself on withholding of results of
candidates in those states that owed it following
appeals from the stakeholders.
He said that the council was still favourably
disposed to granting such credit facilities to states
being a service rendering organisation.
Eguridu urged the affected states to pay up their
debts in order to keep the council running. (NAN)
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