Cut-off points
Most cut-off points are not what students think they are.
A published cut-off usually is not a competitive score. It is the minimum entry requirement for the level, written as the worst aggregate that still qualifies — and reading it as a score is how students talk themselves out of programmes that would have admitted them.
1052
programmes publish the level's entry requirement, not a score
290
publish a genuinely competitive cut-off
7
institutions publish a competitive cut-off at all
Why the number misleads
Ghanaian institutions publish a cut-off for almost every programme, and for 75% of the 1400 programmes in our catalogue that figure is simply the lowest grades that meet the requirement for the level — the equivalent of writing "six credit passes" as a number.
Beside a single programme it reads as a fact. Aggregated across an institution it becomes actively wrong, because it tells you to compete for a figure that in practice admits everybody meeting the basic requirement. Sites that publish these numbers in a table are not giving you an advantage; they are giving you a requirement dressed up as a score.
What we show instead
Every programme in our catalogue carries a band rather than a figure. The band says how hard the programme is to get into, which is the question the number was being used to answer badly.
- Highly competitive
- Only students with near-perfect aggregates get a place here.
- Competitive
- You will need better than the minimum pass grades for this level.
- Less competitive
- Meet the minimum pass grades for this level and you will be considered.
- Not published
- This institution has not published a cut-off for this programme.
Where cut-offs actually mean something
These institutions publish competitive cut-offs on at least some programmes — which is where comparing your aggregate is worth doing at all. Open one to see which of its programmes are the selective ones.
University of Cape Coast
94 selective programmes
Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology
89 selective programmes
University of Ghana
65 selective programmes
Public Nursing Training Colleges
19 selective programmes
University of Health and Allied Sciences
17 selective programmes
University for Development Studies
4 selective programmes
Central University
2 selective programmes
The question worth asking
Not "what is the cut-off" but "do I meet this programme's requirements". Those are different questions: a programme can want a specific elective you did not sit, or your college can restrict the combination, and no aggregate on any list will tell you that. A check reads the actual requirements and tells you which ones you miss, and why.