The West African Examinations Council (WAEC) has indicated that 965 schools are participating in the West Africa Senior School Certificate Examination.
It added that out of which 651 were public schools and 314 private schools.
The number of public schools participating in the 2021 Examination reduced by ten, compared to 2020 which was 641, while private schools increased from 314 to 335.
This year's lot includes 224,884 females and 221,437 males, totalling 446,321 with 763 supervisors and centres.
Ashanti Region had the highest number of candidates with 108,485 students, followed by the Eastern Region with 65,623 candidates participating in the examinations.
The Upper West Region had the lowest representation with 9,338 candidates.
The examination, which commenced with Project Work for Visual Arts candidates yesterday, is expected to come to an end on Friday, October 8, 2021.
Candidates will write the English language (oral) paper on Wednesday, September 2, 2021, while the English language Essay and objective papers would be written on Monday, September 13, 2021.
In 2020, a total of 375,737 candidates in over 796 examination centres across the country wrote the examination.
The Ashanti region had the highest number of candidates 87,295, followed by the Eastern region with 56,467 candidates.
The Bono, Bono East, and Bono West regions presented 45,295 candidates made up of 22,043 males and 23,252 females in that order.
The Central region presented 42,946 candidates, comprising 21,009 males and 21,937 females.
According to the statistics, Greater Accra had 37,974 candidates, 19,484 being females, Oti and Volta regions, 34,466 candidates, 17,622 being males.
In the Northern, Savanna, and North East Regions, 24,830 candidates would be writing the examination with 14,105 being males.
The Western and Western North regions had 24,332 candidates, 12,601 females, Upper East and West regions had 13,334 and 8,798 candidates respectively.
---DGN online