Day: April 27, 2024

Dr. Godwin Kofi Ahlijah, President, High Skies College in Tema, has attributed the high rate of unemployment in Ghana to the country’s non-skill-based educational system.

Dr. Ahlijah said because students were often trained in how to take exams and pass rather than the practical aspect of work when they graduate, it was difficult for them to get employment and fit into industries.

He said: ‘Graduates from our universities either are not relevant in the industry where they are needed, or they can’t do anything for themselves. This graduate unemployment thing shouldn’t have been an issue if we were training them to know how to begin their businesses.’?

He said this during the maiden congregation of the college, which is an affiliate of the University of Cape Coast.

Six graduated with Masters’ degrees, and 10 with diplomas.

Dr Ahlijah described the system of education in Ghana as ‘the awkward style of education’ and said it was the bane of the country’s development, as students are trained to be good exam t
akers who have a lot of knowledge and brilliant when taking exams but found wanting when it comes to implementing the same knowledge in the industry.

He explained that there were three levels of education, with the first being the knowledge base, where the learner is asked to memorise and define things, and the second being application, and then synthesis, where the learner can transport knowledge from one field to another.

He said for a change to occur, it must start with the schools, where they needed to reorient the learners on companies and opportunities instead of asking them to produce verbatim things in their books.

He indicated that such teaching practices and curriculum had led to a disconnect between academia and businesses, making graduates unfit for work.

According to him, there are a lot of business opportunities that are yet to be tapped in Ghana that people must be encouraged to go into instead of waiting for non-existing jobs.

The High Skies College President bemoaned the high-interest ra
te banks charge on loans, which he said also served as a hindrance on the path of graduates from becoming entrepreneurs.

‘If you look around, the interest rate today is almost 30 percent. Who can take money at that rate and do anything meaningful with it? That is where the government is expected to give some tax breaks to push people to create jobs,’he said.

? Dr. Philip Ankamafio Mensah, the Council Chairman of High Skies, urged students to make good use of artificial intelligence tools to enhance their knowledge and skill acquisition.

He said students, in doing so, must also have the necessary knowledge in whatever field they want to apply it to instead of being lazy and just downloading things without even acknowledging the source.

He encouraged graduates to always gain experience with the things they had learned, noting that learning is continuous not only in the classroom but also on the field.?

Source: Ghana News Agency

Renovation works have commenced at the Gundork primary school in the Nabdam District of the Upper East Region, following a Ghana News Agency (GNA) report on the deplorable state of the school’s structure.

Earlier this month, GNA reported about the poor state of the school’s structure, which had its front pillars, particularly from classes one to three, destroyed, exposing iron rods and endangering the lives of students and teachers.

This caught the attention of Mr Jacob Soung Zurobire, Deputy Director, Judicial Training Institute of the Judiciary Service of Ghana, in charge of the training needs of judges and the Judicial Service’s staff, who contributed GH?3,200 for the fixing of the pillars.

‘You (GNA) broke out a story about the Gundork primary school, and considering the fact that the children’s lives are endangered, and as someone who also came from those schools to become a lawyer, I asked the Assemblyman of the area to get the estimates of materials needed for my consideration to save the lives of t
he children.

‘He got back with the estimate consisting of bags of cement and wood, costing about GH?3,100 and so I made a donation of GH?3,200 to fix the problem,’ the Legal Practitioner told the GNA in an interview.

The renovation work, when completed, would make the school again a safe environment for academic activities and possibly prevent any possible collapse of the school.?

He called on other residents of the community to offer support to others in need even before they were satisfied.

‘I advise all of you to support others in need before you get satisfied. Do not get satisfied before you help another person, and by doing so, we can live together and grow together as a community,’ he added.

Mr Isaac Wulug, the Assemblyman of the Zanlerigu Dagliga Electoral Area, who is spearheading the renovation, received the money and thanked the lawyer for his kind gesture in saving the lives of the children.

He explained that the amount would cover the renovation of the pillars; however, the windows and doors
of the school also needed to be fixed, and therefore called on the government and other residents of the community to come to the aid of the school.

Source: Ghana News Agency

Mr Wisdom Kwame Adeti, Headmaster of Anlo Senior High School (ANSECO) at Anloga, has appealed to the contractor working on the school’s dining hall and kitchen facilities to urgently complete the project for use.?

The temporary kitchen structure collapsed during a heavy rainstorm on Tuesday, April 23.

Information available to Ghana News Agency (GNA) suggested that since the commencement of the dining hall and kitchen project in 2012, the school kitchen had been operating under a temporary shed with students dining under the shed made of iron sheets and woods.

The?headmaster made the appeal when a team of top officials from the Anloga District Assembly and National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO) visited the school Thursday to ascertain the level of damage caused by Tuesday’s windstorm.

He said the appeal had become very necessary because it was now very difficult for the school to cook for its students since the temporary kitchen had been destroyed.?

Among structures in the school damaged includ
ed the sports pavilion, two boys’ and girls’ dormitories, school garage, house mistress’ bungalow, Arts studio, Agriculture and ICT laboratory, which all?had parts or entire roofs removed.

Mr Adeti stressed his call in an appeal sighted by GNA Friday, copied to the District Chief Executive (DCE), Member of Parliament, Ghana Education Service and other stakeholders, urging them to get the contractor back to site.

‘We are appealing to your high offices to prevail upon the contractor working on the dining hall/kitchen project since 2012 to complete the facility for us to protect our kitchen staff and students from the vagaries of the weather.’

Investigations proved that the project, currently about 75 percent complete, stalled after the construction firm in charge (Vappy Limited) raised some contractual agreements to be completed before?the actual completion of works on the project.

Mr Seth Yormewu, DCE of Anloga, promised the headmaster that he would act on the matter.

‘I have seen the situation myself and
something must be done. I will quickly engage the people in charge to see how we can contact the contractor so this work can be completed and handed over to the school for use.’

? Other ongoing stalled projects in the school include a 10-seater toilet facility, computer laboratory and 12-unit boys’ and girls’ dormitories.

Source: Ghana News Agency

The National Democratic Congress (NDC) Parliamentary Minority has urged the Education Minister to desist from the rebranding of public basic schools and channel the resources into tackling critical challenges facing basic education in the country.

‘How can the Minister, at this time of economic crisis in Ghana, be thinking of wasting public resources to repaint public schools in Blue and White colours; and introduce wearing of Blue and White uniforms in public schools, when one million plus public basic school pupils have no access to furniture?’

Dr Clement Abas Apaak, the Deputy Ranking Member of Parliament Education Committee and NDC Member of Parliament (MP) for Bulsa South, asked the question in a statement copied to the Ghana News Agency on Saturday.

‘Has the Minister (Education) forgotten, what he told Parliament, during his last visit? In his report to Parliament, it has been captured that only 65 per cent of textbooks have been supplied thus far.’

‘May I remind him that capitation grants are still
in arrears for the equivalent of eight terms?’

He questioned how rebranding could be a priority in the face of these challenges facing public education in Ghana.

Giving a detailed list of shared challenges affecting teaching and learning in public basic schools in Ghana, Dr Apaak mentioned delay in releases of Capitation Grant (10 cedis per head per annum), which was in arrears for eight tranches (equivalent to eight Terms).

Others are infrastructural deficit, especially poor toilet facilities; lack of textbooks from kindergarten to junior high school, more than three years after the introduction of reforms; and no sample questions for 2024 Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) Candidates (the first batch of the New Reform).

The rest are lack of furniture for both teachers and students; lack of security personnel to protect properties of schools, leading to rampant theft cases, unpaid Utility bills (electricity and water) leading to disconnections, while schools in urban areas faced the uphill ta
sk of disposing refuse, because of the lack of money to pay waste collectors.

He said basic school administrators were struggling to manage the affairs of schools, because of inadequate funding, neglect and delay in the releases of the capitation grants.

Dr Apaak said those were issues the Education Minister should be worried about, not the colours of school blocks and school uniforms.

He said spending public time and resources painting schools in blue and white, and introducing blue and white uniforms were clearly misplaced priorities.

‘We call on Ghanaians to join us in resisting this needless initiative in the collective interest of the State of the Republic of Ghana,’ he said.

‘If the Ministry of Education has funds, advisedly, those funds should go to address the long list of challenges narrated by Heads of public basic schools.’

Source: Ghana News Agency

Metropolitan, Municipal and District Chief Executives (MMDCEs) across the country are convinced that Ghana’s education is on the path of progress and transformation with the level of investments made in the sector since 2017.

They are also certain that the sector is in capable hands under the leadership of Dr. Yaw Osei Adutwum who is changing the mindset of stakeholders to embrace 21st century education as a tool for accelerated development.

The MMDCEs expressed these sentiments after a comprehensive presentation by the Minister on the progress made in the education sector since the New Patriotic Party (NPP) resumed office seven years ago.

The goal was to equip the representatives of the President at the local level with the achievements of the Government in education to enable them tell the success stories and also explain the innovative policies being pursued by the Ministry to improve education in Ghana.

The Minister’s presentation touched on investments made at all levels of the educational structure,
Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET), as well as Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) education.

With the aid of a PowerPoint presentation, Dr. Adutwum walked the MMDCEs through what the Ministry had been doing across the country with pictorial and video evidence to bring them up to speed with the paradigm shift in the sector.

To demonstrate how learning outcomes under the current administration had significantly improved at both basic and second cycle levels, he showed the participants both figures and statistics which put the NPP miles ahead of its predecessors.

He also spoke about deliberate policy interventions which targets holistic training of students to be relevant in the global community as the world shift towards the fourth industrial revolution.

The MMDCEs who were obviously amazed by the massive achievements and the vision to transform education in the country, applauded the Minister and his team for a great job done.

Some of them who spoke to the media a
fter the engagement attested to the fact that despite being part of the government, they were not privy to a lot of the information shared by the Minister.

They said much as they were aware of the strides being made by the Government in the education sector, the engagement with the Minister had made them appreciate the direction where Ghana was heading even better.

‘I am overwhelmed by what the Minister and his team has been doing at the Ministry having listened to the presentation he made,’ Mr. Francis Oti Boateng, the District Chief Executive for Asante-Akim North, stated.

He said STEM education was one of the brilliant policies ever introduced in Ghana by any government and urged Ghanaians to embrace it to change the face of education in the country.

‘Our quest to break the eight largely depends on the work of people like Dr. Adutwum and so if we really want to achieve that target, he should be considered for the running mate slot,’ Mr. Eric Tetteh, Municipal Chief Executive for Yilo Krobo, submitted.

D
r. Adutwum said the engagement was to keep the MMDCEs updated with what the Government had accomplished in the education sector as key actors who directly deal with citizens at the local level.

‘In as much as with think they know what is going on, it also important to bring them together and show them what the Government has done elsewhere so they appreciate the development beyond their jurisdictions,’ the Minister explained.

He said in addition to creating access and equity for Ghanaian children, the Ministry was also working towards the creation of more high performing schools to eliminate the phenomenon where every parent wants their wards to attend certain schools.

‘We are affiliating new schools with existing high performing schools and our goal is to make sure that high performing schools will be able to mentor the new schools so that in no time, they will also become high performing schools.

The Minister used the opportunity to clarify that it was only the new buildings being put up with new design
s that were being painted blue and white to make them stand out, and not all public schools as being circulated in the media.

Agencies under the Ministry as part of the engagement took turns to present their activities.

Source: Ghana News Agency