Kpandai District holds Education Accountability Forum
The 2015 edition of the annual Education Accountability Forum has taken place at Kpandai in the Kpandai District of the Northern Region.
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The forum is part of efforts to promote dialogue and commitment by all stakeholders towards improving the standard of education in the district.
It was instituted by the School Management Committees (SMC) Network of Kpandai, which was formed in 2013 through the support of the Danish development organisation, Ibis, as part of efforts to revive SMCs to enable them to play a leading role in the management of schools and education in the district.
Stakeholders who attended the forum identified low number of trained teachers, poor supervision from parents, teacher absenteeism and lack of seriousness on the part of some pupils as the major hindrance to the delivery of quality education at the basic level in the district.
Issues discussed
It was established at the forum that 46 per cent of basic school teachers in the district were untrained, according to records from the district office of the Ghana Education Service (GES) in Kpandai.
It also came out that instead of studying, many children in the district spent their time at night dancing at funerals and attending other social events.
Participants called on the assembly to institute a bye-law to restrict children from attending funerals and other events during the night.
They also urged parents to show greater interest in the education of their children by making sure that they studied at home and also by visiting the schools often to find out about their children’s performances.
The participants further urged school authorities to seize mobile phones from primary and junior high school (JHS) pupils.
They also called on school authorities to organise quizzes and debates to encourage competition among the students and continue with the organisation of mock examinations.
They also appealed to the assembly to provide motorbikes for the GES officers for monitoring as promised during the previous education forum.
Other issues
Participants also discussed the performance of the district in the 2014 Basic Education Certificate Examinations (BECE), which showed a marginal increase in the pass rate from 22.4 per cent in 2013 to 38.4 per cent in 2014. As a result, the district moved from the 16th ranking out of 20 districts in 2013 to the seventh position out of 26 districts in 2014.
According to the District Director of Education, Mr Sixtus Adiko, this was as a result of measures instituted by the education directorate and the implementation of commitments made at the 2014 education forum.
“We organised mock examinations to prepare the candidates as wel as refresher programmes for the teachers. In addition, we intensified supervision and monitoring and sanctioned non-performing teachers, including those who absented themselves from school, by placing an embargo on their salaries,” he said.
The way forward
The Chairman of the SMCs Network, Rev. Father Mawusi Anselmus, said the network was hard-pressed for funds and that its activities were being sponsored largely from the pockets of individual members.
“We want to organise an annual awards ceremony to reward performing teachers, pupils and schools. We also want to organise a District Education Week during which we will hold various activities to keep the people informed and to whip up their interest in various issues affecting education in the district,” he stated.
Reverend Father Anselmus thanked Ibis, United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), Campaign for Female Education (CAMFED) and the East Gonja Civil Society Association (EGOCSA) for their support for education in Kpandai and appealed to them and other development organisations to support the work of the SMCs so that their initiatives would not come to a halt, which could reverse the gains made in education in the district.
