The Head of Public Relations at the West African Examinations Council (WAEC), John Kapi, has expressed serious concern over the growing use of pidgin and social media language in students’ WASSCE scripts, warning that the trend is negatively affecting performance in English.
Speaking on Channel One TV on Friday, December 5, he said the Chief Examiner’s report for the 2025 English paper revealed widespread use of informal language, slang, and WhatsApp-style expressions.
He noted that many candidates struggled to express themselves in standard English, significantly impacting their essay-writing scores.
Markers identified “a lot of pidgin” alongside shorthand, jargon, and casual social media expressions — all of which have no place in a formal examination setting and signal a worrying decline in academic writing standards.
“If you look at the English report, for example, the Chief Examiner indicated there was a lot of pidgin in what the candidates wrote. They also referred to what they called ‘social media language’ or jargons — things we normally use on WhatsApp which are not formal. Especially in the English paper, some candidates could not use standard language, could not spell properly, and could not write their essays appropriately,” he said.
John Kapi added that beyond language misuse, many candidates struggled with spelling and constructing coherent sentences, reflecting gaps both in schools and at home.
He called for a coordinated response involving parents, teachers, and education authorities to reinforce proper language use from early childhood.
“We need to address this from home, from where the children grow up, and also examine whether the school system has enough support structures to help students learn. As a society, there is much we must do to put our children in a position to learn well,” he concluded.
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