The National Examinations Council (NECO) has unveiled the timetable and guidelines for the conduct of its 2020 examinations for Senior Secondary 3 students.

NECO Registrar/Chief Executive Officer, Professor Godswill Obioma disclosed this on Tuesday during a press conference at the Council’s Headquarters in Minna, the Niger State capital.

His briefing is tagged, “Making the Conduct Of Public Examinations Work in the COVID-19 Era.”

The NECO chief noted that the body has rolled out guidelines to enable schools prepare for conduct of the exams.

The guidelines include preparing examination centres and schools in compliance with COVID-19 protocols; decontamination of examination centres and schools; maintaining prescribed physical and social distancing protocols by candidates and examination officials.

Others include the provision of water and hand washing facilities, sanitizers and face masks by school proprietors, managers, parents and guardians as the case may be; as well as use of water, hand washing facilities, sanitizers and face masks by school proprietors, managers, parents/guardians, examination officials candidates and security officials.

On the number of candidates expected to write the examination, Professor Obioma said so far, only 169,144 students have registered for the Senior School Certificate Examination.

He also explained that 104,341 students and 80,110 pupils have so far registered for both the Basic Examination Certificate Examination (BECE) and the National Common Entrance Examination respectively.

This comes two weeks after the Federal Government released a comprehensive schedule for various national examinations for exit classes including Junior Secondary School (JSS) 3 and Senior Secondary School (SSS) 3.

The Minister of State for Education, Chukwuemeka Nwajuiba, who made the announcement on July 29 in Abuja after a series of meetings with chief executives of examination bodies in the country revealed that NECO examination will hold will start on October 5 and end on November 18.

According to him, the National Business and Technical Examination Board (NABTEB) examinations will start on September 21 and end on October 15.

“Other details of the schedule indicate that the Senior Secondary School Certificate Examinations, for SS3, conducted by NECO will start on October 5 and end on November 18, 2020,” he said.

He explained that the Basic Education Certificate Examinations (BECE) for JSS 3 students, also conducted by NECO, will start on August 24 and end on September 7. (Channels TV)

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