The country needs 20,000 teachers to handle some critical subjects at the basic educational level for effective teaching and learning.
They are Ghanaian languages, Pre-Technical Skills, French, Physical Education and Health, as well as Information and Communications Technology (ICT).
“Each of these subjects requires over 4,000 teachers across the country. We believe this has a great effect on the quality education that we all yearn to achieve, the President of the Conference of Directors of Education (CODE), Bernice Ofori, said at the opening of the 29th Annual Conference of CODE (Greater Accra) last week.
She, therefore, called for teachers in those affected subject areas to be provided.
The programme is on the theme: “Sustainability of Free Pre-Tertiary Education in Ghana: The Surest Step to Human Resource Development”.
Mrs Ofori said there was the need to build a sound foundation of learners if the country wanted to achieve good educational outcomes, adding that “presently, there is a serious deficit with kindergarten infrastructure”.
Minister
The Minister of Education, Dr Yaw Osei Adutwum, said professional development for the directors was more critical and that consequently, the government would activate the National Education Leadership Institute.
That, he said, was a programme approved by Cabinet, adding that it would begin training by providing an opportunity for the directors.
He said it was in his interest for the directors to become the best since together they would help transform the education sector for the better.
Dr. Adutwum said the government was doing a lot in terms of provision of new school infrastructure, resources, among other things for the sector.
Those forms of support, he said, were also going for existing schools, adding that for instance, 100 schools would be provided with computer laboratories.
New schools
Dr Adutwum said no new schools would commence without their Science laboratories being completed.
He cited 100 kindergarten blocks that had been constructed across the country, saying it was surprising that people only spoke about schools under trees without mentioning the new facilities.
“You see, all that I want to say is that we are not where we want to be but we are not where we used to be. There have been some movements. We may not be satisfied but as a country we have done some movement,” he said, adding that there was the need to appreciate that instead of always talking about the challenges.
Dr Adutwum charged the directors to endeavour to give of their best for the betterment of the educational system and for Ghanaian children.
If you do your work well, my work has been done well. One thing I like to do is to listen to people. So if something is not coming it’s not because I am not fighting, but I keep on fighting for you to get the resources you need so that we can do a better job for the people of Ghana,” he said.
He said there were 48 Senior High Schools (SHSs) where the pass rate to university was one per cent or less, adding that “we can do better than that”.
Moreover, he said there were 50 per cent of SHSs where the pass rate (A1-C6) to university was 10 per cent, noting that the country could do better than that.
On the issue of food in SHSs, he admitted that there were challenges because of the issue with supply chain.
Feeding
The minister said the government had released GH¢51 million to the buffer stock and last week released GH¢41 million to heads of schools for the purchase of perishables.
He gave an assurance of the provision of resources, including the Capitation Grant for their operation.
The Provost of the College of Humanities of the University of Ghana, Prof. Daniel Frimpong Ofori, said there was the need to ensure that the resources that were committed to pre-tertiary education were adequate now and into the foreseeable future.
