Prez commends lesser known schools
President John Dramani Mahama has hailed lesser-known schools for the tremendous academic strides they have been posting in recent times.
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Describing the development as a "revolution" that could not be glossed over, he said it gave a clear indication that something good was happening to Ghana's educational system.
President Mahama was speaking at the 22nd National Best Teacher and the Second Best School awards in Sunyani yesterday.
"In the past, there was a constant number of well-recognised privileged schools that always swept the best performances in results at different levels of the educational structure.
"Today, as I sit here and listen to some of the names, I found that it is not only the privileged schools that can perform well. Some of these schools are from districts and regions where a lot of parents do not want their children to go. I believe that something good is happening to Ghana's educational system," he said.
Interventions
President Mahama touched on various interventions the government had made in the educational sector and said they were paying off.
For instance, he said, the re-training of Science and Mathematics teachers had contributed to a marked improvement in students' performance in the two subjects that used to be problem areas for them.
Providing statistics, he said in Science the number of students who scored between A1 and A6 in the 2016 WASSCE increased from 23.5 per cent in 2015 to 48.5 per cent.
Also in Core Mathematics, the number of students who scored between A1 and A6 increased from 25 per cent in 2015 to 32 per cent in 2016.
President Mahama added that the provision of books, free school uniforms and sandals to some schoolchildren at the basic level was also yielding results.
"The results of this year's BECE appear to vindicate the investment we have been making over the past several years," he stated, and congratulated teachers who prepared this year’s BECE candidates for the good job they did.
"Surely no one can point at this and call it a steady decline, unless that person has a special way of interpreting data the way we don't know of," he said.
Touching on the community day senior high schools under construction, he said by the end of this year 70 of them would be ready.
Validation
President Mahama said the validation exercise being undertaken by the Ministry of Education, in conjunction with the teacher unions, was bringing sanity into the payment of teachers.
He said as of May 2016, 13,297 documents of teachers had been validated and payment made to 13,203 of them.
In July 2016, the documents of an additional 3,117 teachers were validated and payment effected, he added.
He recognised teachers who distinguished themselves in the awards, as well as all teachers, for working hard to move education forward.
He said the country recognised teachers as being pivotal in national development and would continue to build on their professionalism .
Making reference to teacher absenteeism, which is a disincentive to education, the President said processes put in place by the authorities were yielding results, as absenteeism had decreased from 27 per cent in 2013 to seven per cent currently.
Theme appropriate
President Mahama stated that the theme for the awards: "Valuing teachers, improving their status", was in line with the government's conviction that quality teaching and learning was a shared responsibility of all stakeholders.
The theme, according to the organisers of the awards, was selected basically to alert society to the contribution of teachers and non-teaching staff to national development and to motivate them to work even harder.
Two years ago, the awards were reorganised to include best performing schools
Minister of Education
For her part, the Minister of Education, Professor Naana Jane Opoku-Agyeman, said it was necessary that the standard of teachers be kept high at all times with the expansion in the frontiers of knowledge.
She said the high priority of the government on education reflected in many ways, including the continued investment of more than 30 per cent of its annual budget estimates in the sector alone.
She gave an assurance that the government would continue to dispense its responsibility to both teaching and non-teaching staff, while the public continued to hold them to account for outcomes in education.
Responding to some concerns raised by the President of the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT), Ms Philipa Larsen, Prof. Opoku-Agyeman stated that all teacher unions were adequately represented on all committees at the regional and national levels and advised teachers to channel all their grievances through their representatives.
