Stakeholders in education have proposed a significant change in the country’s Free Senior High School (SHS) education policy, suggesting that boarding students should be allowed to pay for their boarding and feeding fees.
They suggested that only day students should be allowed to attend school for free in order to alleviate some of the financial burdens on the government.
At the Bono, Bono East, Ahafo and Western North zone of the ongoing National Education Forum in Sunyani last Monday, stakeholders said the proposed funding model would promote quality education since the government would have enough resources to invest in other sectors of education.
The stakeholders gave the recommendations after group discussions on five thematic areas, namely infrastructure, including physical and educational technology; quality education provision, education financing, regulatory and accountability systems, and evidence for decision making.
The stakeholder groups included members of academia, civil society organisations, students, parents, teacher unions, vice-chancellors, regional directors of education, and directors of technical and vocational education and training.
Venture into farming
The stakeholders expressed the need for schools, particularly SHSs, to venture into farming to raise revenue and support the feeding of students.
They also urged the government to make the various scholarship schemes functional for particularly tertiary level students to access the funds.
The stakeholders explained that most of the scholarship schemes existed in name, but were not available for students to access.
The participants said they had observed that financial challenges for some students remained a major frustrating tool, which affected the performance of students.
They also encouraged the Ministry of Education to ensure that quality teachers were posted to schools while refreshers and professional courses were organised for them periodically.
Infrastructure deficit
On infrastructure, they advised the government to invest heavily in the country’s educational infrastructure and improve the conditions of service of teachers to enhance quality education.
The stakeholders, who bemoaned the huge infrastructure deficit in the country, said there were over 5,000 dilapidated school facilities, including schools under trees, scattered across the country.
They also said the country had about a one million school furniture deficit.
They said the huge furniture deficit had compelled thousands of schoolchildren to sit on the bare floor and lie on their stomachs to undertake academic activities.
The stakeholders, therefore, urged the government to decentralise the procurement of furniture to address the huge furniture gap in schools.
They also encouraged local artisans as well as traditional and opinion leaders to support the government to produce furniture to promote quality education.
Juicy incentives
The participants urged the government to motivate teachers and grant them some juicy incentives to make them stay in the service and give their best.
The stakeholders in their presentations urged the government to ensure that school blocks were built with teachers’ accommodation.
They explained that the lack of teachers’ accommodation was one of the major challenges undermining quality education in the country.
They said there was also limited access to technology in the country’s educational facilities, which they said needed to be resolved to build a robust educational system.
They also bemoaned the lack of sanitation facilities in some schools, and called on the government to prioritise resolving sanitation issues in schools to improve teaching and learning.
They said the lack of female-friendly washrooms in some schools impeded female education, and appealed to the government to address the situation to promote quality education, especially among females.
Decentralise recruitment
The stakeholders also asked the government to decentralise the recruitment of teachers, explaining that it was important for heads of institutions to be involved in the recruitment of teachers.
They said the current situation where teachers were recruited without the involvement of the heads of the schools was not healthy for the educational system.
They, therefore, asked the government to revert to the old recruitment process where the heads of institutions were allowed to participate in recruiting teachers for their schools.
They said the lack of access to school at the primary level still remained a challenge, explaining that there were some communities without schools, while others with schools had poor infrastructure.
They urged the government to improve on the security situation in schools through the establishment of police posts in addition to the installation of closed circuit television cameras to enhance security on campuses to give students the free mind to study.
The stakeholders also asked the ministry to prioritise digital infrastructure and Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics, as well as Artificial Intelligence (AI) education, including zoom and online teaching and learning, in tertiary institutions.
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