CSSPS school placement: how to check your placement, self-placement and reporting dates

How to check your BECE school placement

1. 1Open the official portalGo to cssps.gov.gh and choose Check placement. The address ends in .gov.gh. If a site asks you to pay, it is not the official one.
2. 2Sign in with your own detailsThe portal asks for your BECE index number (10 digits followed by the last two digits of the exam year) and the date of birth on your candidate record. Enter them on the official site only, never on ours and never in a chat group.
3. 3Read what you were placed inIt shows your school, programme and whether you are a day or boarding student. Print the placement slip and the enrolment form if they are available.
4. 4Not placed, or placed outside your choices?Go to Self-placement on the same site. It only works for candidates who were not placed automatically.
5. 5Enrol at the schoolTake the printed documents to the school you were placed in, with a parent or guardian, and complete the enrolment forms. The school needs your details to enrol you, so a representative has to be present.

The CSSPS candidate manual lists the same steps for each service. If the portal says your index number is not found, it tells you to check the index number and date of birth, and to contact support if the error continues.

Source: CSSPS, 2026.

Schools that still had places

Choosing a school for self-placement starts with knowing where places are left. We copied the official vacancy list and made it searchable by region, programme, gender and day or boarding.Search the schools with vacancies.

What to do if you were not placed

Every qualified candidate ends up with a place, either automatically or through self-placement. A deputy minister, quoted by the Ghana News Agency after the 2026 release, said the problem was not a shortage of places but a mismatch between where vacancies were and where candidates wanted to go.

• Use self-placement. Sign in with the same details, choose Day or Boarding, and the portal lists only schools that still have vacancies for your aggregate.
• Pick a school and programme with space. The manual says to choose a region, then a school with a vacancy, then a programme and residence, then submit and return to Check placement for your documents.
• Change your mind if you need to. You can change your self-placement school as many times as spaces allow, and the changes stop once you enrol.
• Ask for help locally. The guidelines tell parents and candidates to visit the Metro, Municipal or District Education office.
• Special cases. Candidates with special needs, seminarians and protocol allocations are placed manually through separate processes.

The portal’s vacancy page lists the schools that had vacancies. It is a live page that changes, so look at it on the day.

Source: Ministry of Education and CSSPS, 2026.

School selection: how the eight choices work

Your choices are made on a school selection form before the BECE results, signed by a parent or guardian and handed to the JHS head teacher. The form is the highest-stakes part of the whole process, because automatic placement only uses the eight schools you named.

Category A, B and C are the Ministry’s tiers. There is no official public list of which school is in which, so we do not print one. Our Category A, B and C page has the rules, the official counts of places and the reasons.

Source: Ministry of Education, 2026.

How placement actually works

1. 1Choose, at registrationYour school choices, programmes and day or boarding status are made on the selection form before anyone knows how you did.
2. 2Sit the BECESix subjects count towards your aggregate: the four core subjects and your two best electives.
3. 3Automatic placementCSSPS goes down your choices in order. If your aggregate is within the merit for the programme and residence in choice one, it places you there. If not, it moves to choice two, and so on. It will not put a boarding choice into a day place.
4. 4Self-placement, if you need itCandidates who were not placed choose from schools and programmes with vacancies remaining.
5. 5Report to schoolWith the placement documents, on the date the school and GES set. Everyone qualified ends up placed.

This cycle and the last

Source: Ghana News Agency and Graphic Online, 2026.

Questions about BECE and CSSPS placement

Is the BECE school placement out?

Yes. The 2026 placement was released on 4 September 2026, at 10pm. 527,932 of the 604,567 candidates who qualified were placed automatically, which is 87.3%. Candidates who were not placed can use self-placement on cssps.gov.gh.

How to check BECE school placement 2026?

Go to cssps.gov.gh, choose Check placement, and sign in with your BECE index number and the date of birth on your candidate record. The portal then shows your school, programme and residence type (day or boarding), and lets you print the placement slip and enrolment form. Only use cssps.gov.gh, checking is free there, and we never ask for your index number.

Where can I find the senior school placement portal?

The official portal is cssps.gov.gh, run for the Ministry of Education and linked from the Ghana Education Service. Type the address yourself or use the button at the top of this page. It has separate services for checking placement, self-placement, re-entry and foreign students.

What is the cut-off aggregate for a good school?

There is none published. Placement is by merit, using your aggregate from the four core subjects and your two best electives, but how far an aggregate gets you depends on the school and programme you chose, the residence you chose, and how many other candidates with equal or better aggregates chose the same. The guidelines give the example that a Science programme and a boarding place are usually the most competitive. Anyone quoting a single cut-off for a school is guessing.

How is the aggregate worked out?

From six subjects: English, Mathematics, Integrated Science and Social Studies, plus your two best electives. A lower number is better, because grade 1 is the highest. When too many candidates with the same aggregate want the same programme, the guidelines break the tie by raw score in the four core subjects and then by performance in English, Mathematics, Integrated Science and Social Studies, in that order.

I was not placed in any of my choices. What now?

Use self-placement on cssps.gov.gh. It shows only schools that still have vacancies, based on your aggregate, and you pick a school, programme and day or boarding. You can change your self-placement choice on the portal until you enrol in a school. The guidelines also tell parents to visit the Metro, Municipal or District Education office for help.

Can a candidate with good grades miss all their choices?

Yes. The guidelines say places are filled competitively by programme and residence. A candidate with a good aggregate can miss a choice if the school's places in that programme and residence were taken by candidates ranked higher. The rest move to the next choice, and then to self-placement.

Can I use self-placement to swap a school I did get?

No. If you were placed in one of your own eight choices, that placement stands. The CSSPS portal says automatic placement is final and that self-placement is for candidates who were not placed. The guidelines give the same answer: you cannot change to another school if the school was one of your eight choices.

Can I change my programme or day and boarding status after placement?

No. The guidelines say neither the residence nor the programme can be changed after placement, because you competed for the place on those choices. Moving schools after enrolment counts as a transfer, and the guidelines say a student can only transfer after one academic year.

How many schools do I choose, and how many can be Category A?

Eight schools in total, ranked in order, with five as boarding and three as day. In the 2026 guidelines you cannot choose more than two Category A schools or more than three Category B schools, and you may choose all eight from Category C and Pilot Private schools. We explain the categories, and what we could and could not find, on our Category A, B and C page.

When do first-year students report to school?

The Ghana Education Service's 2026/2027 calendar, as reported by Graphic Online on 1 June 2026, has senior high schools reopening on 18 September 2026. No separate official reporting date for new students has been published, so if you were placed and have not reported, ask your placed school or your district education office straight away.

How many candidates sit the BECE?

603,328 sat it in 2025, from 19,505 schools. For 2026, 604,567 candidates qualified for placement.

Related lists

• Top 20 senior high schools in Ghana
• Category A, B and C schools by region
• Leading girls' senior high schools
• Leading boys' senior high schools