The West African Examinations Council (WAEC) says it will sensitise and train its workforce on key areas of technology deployment in order to improve its operations in 2018.
The council’s Head, National Office (HNO), Mr Olu Adenipekun disclosed this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Saturday in Lagos.
According to him, the council has organised series of retreats for both management staff and the workforce in preparatory to deploy technology in its operations.
“We have worked hard in sensitising the workforce of the council and prepare their minds because it is one thing for one to strive to do something
“But if the people that drives the system are not attuned psychologically, to doing that all such efforts will be fruitless.
“So, we want to prepare our psyche on the need to sharpen our tools in preparation to move over to a 100 per cent technologically driven WAEC and of course we have done that and we are going full blast,’’ he said.
The HNO noted that already, the council’s budget for 2018 had been fully designed to support the introduction of technology into the various aspects of its operation in Nigeria.
He explained that the move would put WAEC at the level it was expected to be in the comity of examination bodies worldwide.
“Members of staff of the council must be able to go beyond being a staff of the ICT Department. Even if one is a messenger, one should be able to ask how he can deploy technology to carry out his duties and this applies to all other operational components of council.
“So, this is an era where we are looking at 2018 as a year where we will be deploying technology in all facets of our operations, not just in conducting examination, processing of results and printing of certificates but in all areas of our operations,’’ the HNO said.
On the possibility of introducing Computer Based Test (CBT) platform for its examination, Adenipekun said that the CBT was not an examination mode that was limited to any particular examination body.