Lee Ocran on war path with CHASS over unapproved fees

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Created on Wednesday, 21 November 2012 00:00

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Lee Ocran on war path with CHASS over unapproved fees

{sidebar id=10 align=right}The Education Minister Lee Ocran has warned he will take drastic disciplinary action against headteachers of secondary schools who have become notorious for charging unapproved fees.

He said those heads are likely to be transferred into district offices or demoted.

The Minister is accusing CHASS of charging many unapproved fees including, headmaster retirement fees, Hepatitis B fees etc.

He said it is the government that bears the brunt of angry parents when these ridiculous fees are charged.

He has also directed the head teachers to stop charging the Gh¢2.50 as feeding fees and revert to Gh¢1.80 they have been charging in the past.

The head teachers say, reverting to the old fees will have a deleterious effect on the quality of food they serve to the students.

A former General Secretary of CHASS Felix Ahiano said the Gh¢1.80 feeding fee being charged was unsustainable.

He explained to Joy News for every Gh¢1.80 paid per student, break fast, lunch and supper are provided.

He said it is from the same amount that cooking utensils and other kitchen equipment are bought.

He appealed to the Ministry to pay the compromised fee of Gh¢2.50 having kicked against Gh¢3.00 earlier proposed.

He was also quick to add that the students who are adolescents are beginning to eat more than they did growing up.

But the Minister is adamant. He told Joy News’ Evans Mensah the head teachers cannot continue to charge ridiculous fees.

He argued if the heads are complaining that Gh¢1.80 will affect the quality of food provided to the students, what will happen if parents no longer bear any feeding cost at all as the NPP is proposing under the free senior high school education policy.

He charged the head masters to speak up on the controversial issue.

Lee Ocran gave a stern warning that the Ministry will not tolerate head teachers who flout the directive issued.

From:Nathan Gadugah/Myjoyonline.com

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Ghanaian Girls Have Less Chance Of Enrolling In School - Report

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Category: The ClassRoom

Created on Thursday, 15 November 2012 00:00

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Ghanaian Girls Have Less Chance Of Enrolling In School - Report

Ghanaian girls still have a less chance of enrolling in school in spite of progress made at improving access to education, a recent global report on Ghana disclosed on Wednesday.

{sidebar id=11 align=right}The 10th edition of the Education for All Global Monitoring Report (EFAGMR) said 53 per cent of poor girls living in the Northern Region had never been to school.

It said more needed to be done to overcome inequalities due to poverty and gender adding that progress in education was not reaching the marginalized.

Mr Kwame Akyeampong, a policy analyst with United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), who read the report at a ceremony organized in Accra stressed that Ghana needed to invest more in the educational sector to meet the Millennium Development Goals on education.

“Among those who had completed nine years of school in 2008, 21 per cent were illiterate, about a quarter were only partially literate”, he said.

The EFAGMR aimed at tracking progress, identifying effective policy reforms and best practices in the six-pronged education goals to be achieved by 2015 as agreed upon in Senegal.

In April 2000, more than 1,100 participants from 164 countries met in Dakar, Senegal for the World Education forum and adopted the Dakar Framework for Action, Education for All: Meeting Our Collective Commitments”.

The goals are to: expand early childhood care and education, achieve universal primary education, promote learning and life skills for young people and adults, reduce adult illiteracy by 50 per cent, and to achieve gender parity and equality.

Mr Akyeampong said almost a third of young people had less than a lower secondary education and lacked the foundation skills needed for getting adequately-paid work.

“In rural areas, 48 per cent of young women aged 15-24 have less than a lower secondary education, compared to 39 per cent of young men.

Mr Akyeampong said “both the urban and rural poor suffer from poor foundation skills”, adding that only nine per cent of richest urban had less than a lower secondary education, compared with around half of the rural and urban poor.

He said Ghana was showing strong commitment towards funding education saying 5.6 per cent of Ghana’s national plans were spent on education in 2010, increasing from 4.2 per cent in 1999.

Mr Acheampong said “there are also positive signs of providing support to the disadvantaged young people through Ghana’s national plans”, adding that the Shared Growth and Development Agenda 2010-2013 included objectives to expand training for workers in the informal sector.

He said primary education was being “squeezed” in budgets and “Ghana has increased the share of the education budget earmarked for tertiary education which now makes up 23 per cent of public expenditure on education, the shares for both primary and secondary education, on the other hand, have decreased since 1999.”

With just three years to go until the deadline for the goals to be met, the global report shows that improvements in early childhood care and education for many countries have been too slow.

It also indicates that progress towards universal primary education was stalling with many young people lacking foundation skills.

The EFAGMR shows adult illiteracy remained an elusive goal and gender disparities took a variety of forms.

It also indicates that global inequality in learning outcomes remained stark because as many as 250 million children worldwide could be failing to read or write by the time they reached grade four.

Source: GNA/Ghana

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Asebu Gets SHS

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Category: The NoticeBoard

Created on Monday, 19 November 2012 00:00

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Asebu Gets SHS

The paramount chief of Asebu Traditional Area, Nana Dr Okatakyi Amenfi VII, as part of efforts to make Senior High School (SHS) Education accessible in the traditional area, is constructing an SHS at Amosima in Abura-Asebu-Kwamankese (AAK) District of the Central Region.

In view of that, a committee will be inaugurated for its take-off in 2013-2014 academic years, using temporary accommodation while efforts will be made to develop the permanent site earmarked for the school.

{sidebar id=11 align=right}Nana Dr Amenfi disclosed these over the weekend at the annual Apayamkese Festival celebrated by the chiefs and people of Asebu.

The paramount chief noted that the theme for the festival, ‘Empowering the Youth through Education-Key to Development’, was chosen because they believed the future of the traditional area depended on the youth.

He said the Amenfi VII Educational Fund, which was instituted in 2010 to offer support to the development of education in the area, had become operational, adding that five needy but brilliant people who completed Junior High School (JHS) and needed to further their education to SHS benefited from the fund.

He expressed his sadness about the deplorable state of roads leading to the town and therefore called for their immediate repairs.

Nana Dr Amenfi hinted that a number of marvelous sites linked to Amenfi the Great had been identified in various communities and would soon be developed to boost the tourism sector in the country.

He expressed worry about the lack of employment in the area, which had forced young people to leave the area.

He therefore asked government to make a conscious effort to create oil-related job avenues in the region to reduce the unemployment situation in the area.

The paramount chief, who is also the vice chairman of the Central Regional House of Chiefs, revealed that he had released a parcel of land to a foreign company to establish a fruit processing factory at Asebu and hoped the factory would soon be in operation.

He stressed the need for government to provide more health facilities with qualified staff.

The paramount chief commended various political party leaders for conducting their campaign in a peaceful manner, without insult and acrimony and charged followers not to allow themselves to be used to create mayhem on the Election Day.

Six people who have contributed towards the development of the area were honored by the traditional council.

They include Vice President Paa Kwesi Amissah-Arthur and the Abura Dunkwa District Police Commander, DSP Bernard Twum-Barimah.

From Sarah Owusu-Darlington, Asebu

Source: Daily Guide/Ghana

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Volta Youth Caucus declares support for Nana Akufo-Addo’s free SHS

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Created on Wednesday, 14 November 2012 00:00

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Volta Youth Caucus declares support for Nana Akufo-Addo’s free SHS

Volta Youth Caucus (VYC), a non-political pro-Volta Region advocacy group, has said the New Patriotic Party’s Free Senior High School (SHS) promise, could close the education access gap between the 'haves' and 'have-nots' in society.

It said the policy was apt for the circumstances of the people of the Volta Region, where there was evidence of many young people truncating school at JSS Level because of cost of SHS education.

{sidebar id=12 align=right}Ernest Agyei-Tuffour, VYC Executive-Secretary, speaking at a press conference in Ho on Tuesday said, it was therefore logical that people in the Volta Region discarded all sentimental attachments to parties seeking to defer the free-SHS- now concept, to a later date.

He said young people in the Volta Region stood to gain from the promise by Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, Presidential Candidate of the NPP.

Mr Agyei-Tuffour, who hails from the Volta Region, said it was naive for people with the means to see their children through secondary education at whatever cost, to push those without that means, to reject the policy because “it is impossible”.

To a question whether the much touted policy was possible, he said, it was better to give Nana Akufo-Addo the opportunity, and vote him out, if he failed than spurn policy.

Mr Agyei-Tuffour said the VYC was endorsing the policy because it could veer the country on to the path of speedy development, backed by a more educated population as happened in countries with similar policies.

He quoted World Bank report to support the VYC’s stand, which says “secondary education is a gateway to the opportunities and benefits of economic and social development….’

Mr Agyei-Tuffour said claims that there were no schools to absorb the numbers, in the event of secondary education becoming free was untenable.

He said in the Volta Region for example there were a lot of Senior High schools, with very low enrolment, which only needed to be resourced better to attract students.

Mr Agyei-Tuffour said it was ironical for President John Mahama to recount with glee in his book “My First Coup D’état,” the attractions of the free SHS in north and refuse same for others.

He said excuses of resource constraints, was not tangible, in the wake of the lavish spending and underhand dealings leading to huge loss of state money under this government.

Mr Agyei-Tuffour appealed to chiefs in the Volta Region to stop marshalling their people in support of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) but allow them to base their decisions on policy proposal of the political parties and not sentiments for us (VYC).

“We are declaring today that until the day of the election, we will tour the whole region to canvas for votes for the NPP and Nana Akufo-Addo, so that he can implement this great human-centred policy for all”.

From: Ghana l GNA

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