The National Science and Math Quiz (NSMQ) formerly known as the Brilliant Science and Maths Quiz is an annual science and maths quiz featuring senior high schools in Ghana. The competition has always been a rallying point for Ghanaian senior high schools as the crème de la crème battle each other through speed tests and riddles. 

Since its inception in Ghana, it has seen tremendous improvements and changes. In the early years of the competition, fewer schools participated and hence schools were paired to face each other. However, after a two-year break (2010 and 2011), the competition was expanded to include more schools. This resulted in a three-school “face-off” competition for each quiz. The finalists therefore increased from two per season to three. It got bigger and better.

As a young man growing up in Ghana, thoughts of the quiz bring back nostalgic feelings. I remember the likes of “Bubune” of Mfantsipim School and “Azunre” of Opoku Ware School in the late 90’s and early 2000’s. I was always awed by the prowess of the contestants. 

For many junior high school candidates, this quiz was a major deciding factor in choosing a senior high school.  

However, the focus of this article is not to reminisce. This article is more about what I love to do ie. bring clarity to issues through insights which is at the heart of what we do at Eureka Business Intelligence.

I took the liberty to create a dashboard on the NSMQ. Dashboards are built to answer specific questions and objectives. The objective of this dashboard was to understand the dynamics of finalists in this prestigious quiz. I started out with the following:

QUESTIONS TO BE ANSWERED

1. Which schools have been to the finals and what are the distinct counts of schools?
2. Which schools have won most trophies in the quiz?
3. What have been the trends and patterns in the finalists of the competition? 
4. What has been the success rates of the finalists?
5. Are there any other factors like that affect schools being in the final eg. Region, sex etc.
6. Any other insights that could be drawn from the data

KEY INSIGHTS

1. Only 17 schools have made it to the final since the beginning of the competition with only 11 distinct winning schools 
2. Presbyterian Boys Secondary School has been to the most finals (9 in all) in the competition and has won the most trophies (6 times).
3. This closely followed by St. Peters High School (8 times) and Opoku Ware School (8 times). However, these 2 schools have won only 3 and 2 times respectively. This computes a success rate at the final of 25% and 38% respectively.
4. Of all the schools to have won the competition, Adisadel College has the lowest success rate at the finals with 1 win after 5 appearances.
5. Also 6 schools have made appearances in the final without winning any trophy.
6. Pope John’s Secondary School and St Augustine’s College have a 100% success rate having appeared in the final once and twice respectively and won the trophy in all their appearances.
7. No female school has won the competition. However, Wesley Girls and Mfantsiman Girls Secondary are the only 2 “all female” schools to have reached the finals in the competition (1999 and 2013 respectively). Both of these schools are in the Central Region.
8. Achimota School is the mixed with the most trophies (2) as well as most appearances in the final (4). This school is in the Greater Accra Region.
9. 23 competitions out of 25have been won by “all male schools” (92%).
10. Greater Accra has the most appearances at the final (16 appearances) followed by Ashanti and Central regions with 14 appearances each.
11. Central region has the most distinct schools appearing in the final.
12. Greater Accra and Central regions have 3 distinct schools each winning the competition.

Eureka Business Intelligence is a consulting firm that exists to take care of your business intelligence needs. We are a team of engineers, data analysts, and business strategists well-versed in our various fields. We provide user-friendly and intuitive modern BI tools to help users create outstanding reports.