By Kofi Asare,Executive Director,Africa Education Watch,Ghana Background Before the introduction of Free SHS, the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) primarily functioned as a gatekeeping mechanism that determined whether a child could progress to secondary education. Admission into second cycle institutions depended heavily on aggregate performance, and for many candidates, BECE effectively separated progression from exclusion. In that context, its broad, high stakes structure was aligned with a system in which access to secondary education was limited and competitive. Emergence of the Free SHS Policy The Free SHS policy fundamentally changed…
Rethinking BECE in the Era of Free SHS: From Gatekeeping to Placement Reform
