The latest Chief Examiner’s assessment for the 2025 WASSCE for School Candidates has provided a detailed look into the widespread challenges students faced in three of the four compulsory subjects. The report, which focuses on identified weaknesses, highlights patterns that contributed to the disappointing outcomes recorded this year.
The review of the Mathematics (Core) paper shows that many candidates struggled with tasks that required interpretation, analysis, and application. Students encountered difficulties translating word-based questions into mathematical expressions, representing information graphically, and working with cumulative frequency tables.
Basic financial calculations such as simple interest, as well as solutions to broader real-life mathematical scenarios, also proved challenging.
The examiner noted a clear dip in overall performance when compared with the previous sitting.
Despite these setbacks, candidates showed confidence in areas such as the midpoint concept, mensuration questions, average speed problems, and finding distances between two points.
Performance in Social Studies also exposed gaps in knowledge application. Many students were unable to explain the economic effects of lavish funerals on national development or outline government programmes aimed at improving citizens’ wellbeing. Another weak area involved Ghana’s cooperation with UN agencies, where responses lacked depth and clarity.
Still, the report highlighted several strengths.
Candidates generally understood concepts such as Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and could relate it to students’ lives. They also effectively examined the influence of Western education on Ghanaian society, the environmental implications of rapid population growth, and individual strategies for improving one’s socio-economic situation.
The performance review for Integrated Science revealed shortcomings in fundamental topics. Many candidates were unable to define concepts like relative atomic mass, interpret graphs or calculate slopes, or spell basic scientific terms correctly. Drawings of bar magnets and lines of force were often inaccurate, and descriptions of post-harvest practices such as dehusking, winnowing and shelling were incomplete. Candidates also struggled with naming food-testing reagents and producing correct genetic diagrams.
There were, however, notable strengths. Students performed better in energy transformations, explanations of the mole concept, the purpose of standard solutions, advantages of parallel circuits in homes, issues affecting pig production in Ghana, and the stages involved in water treatment.
How Students Performed: Subject-by-Subject Breakdown
The distribution of grades across the four core subjects paints a mixed picture:
- Mathematics:
- A1–C6: 209,068 students (48.73%)
- D7: 52,991 (11.62%)
- E8: 52,145 (12.15%)
- F9: 114,872 (26.77%)
- Integrated Science:
- A1–C6: 220,806 (57.74%)
- D7: 54,580 (11.85%)
- E8: 45,783 (11.79%)
- F9: 61,243 (16.05%)
- Social Studies:
- A1–C6: 248,538 (55.82%)
- D7: 33,670 (7.38%)
- E8: 40,608 (9.12%)
- F9: 122,449 (27.50%)
- English Language:
- A1–C6: 289,673 (60%)
- D7: 37,712 (8.18%)
- E8: 39,091 (9.23%)
- F9: 54,294 (12.86%)
WAEC is expected to release a more comprehensive version of the Chief Examiner’s Report in the coming days.
The Mathematical Association of Ghana (MAG) has attributed the worrying maths results to weak English comprehension among candidates. The association explained that students often fail to understand mathematical word problems because they are unable to interpret the English text before converting it into mathematical form.
MAG further stressed that mathematics requires daily practice, discipline, and active engagement with problem-solving—habits many students have not developed.
On the teaching side, the association observed that some teachers limit their focus to preferred topics rather than covering the full syllabus, leaving students unprepared when unfamiliar questions appear.
MAG encouraged teachers to refresh their knowledge regularly and urged parents to supervise students’ work and ensure they practise past questions consistently.
The association plans to organise refresher programmes for teachers and noted that the downward trend in mathematics performance has been evident since as far back as 2006, largely due to persistent gaps in language comprehension.
