Political parties pledge more support for science education
The two main political parties and the independent presidential candidate have pledged to allocate more resources to science and technology education.
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The Independent Presidential Candidate, Mr Jacob Osei Yeboah, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Member of Parliament for Abuakwa North, Ms Gifty Twum Ampofo, as well as Mr Prince Addo of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) made their policy statements at a forum in Accra.
Making separate statements at the forum last Tuesday, the NPP, the NDC and the independent presidential candidate in this year’s election highlighted the policies in their manifestos that aimed at improving science and technology.
The political parties made the pledges when the Ghana Association of Science Teachers (GAST) interacted with the political parties whose presidential aspirations were approved by the Electoral Commission (EC) for the December 7, election.
The Convention’s Peoples Party (CPP), however, was not represented.
Restructuring the Ministry
At the event, Mr Jacob Osei Yeboah said the education standard in the country continued to fall because little attention had been paid to science and technology, adding that in countries such as China, a person could not become president when he did not have a science background.
Mr Yeboah said when voted into power, his government would ensure that science was considered in all aspects of the country’s development, adding that there was a gap between the ministries and academia.
He, therefore, urged the GAST to come up with measures that would ensure that textbooks were edited before sending them to the market.
Strengthen Science and Mathematics
For his part, a representative of the NDC, Mr Prince Addo, said the government would continue to strengthen Science and Mathematics as the party’s manifesto had indicated.
According to him, incentives will be given to teachers who accept postings to rural areas to make education attractive in the remote villages.
Mr Addo said the science scholarships scheme, which sponsored brilliant students to study, would be re-introduced.
Strengthen Infrastructure
For her part, Ms Ampofo indicated that the solutions to the problems the country was facing was found in the NPP manifesto.
She stated that people saw science improvement as the availability of laboratory in a school, but it included the infrastructure needs to improve the study of science.
Consult GAST
The President of GAST, Rev. Thomas Kofi Arboh, appealed to publishers of science textbooks to consult the association to ensure that such books brought to the market were factual.
He said mistakes had been identified in most science textbooks in circulation and that had affected the performance of some students in the various sciences at both the junior and the senior high school levels.
Rev. Arboh said teachers and parent-teacher associations also had a role to play to ensure that quality books were provided for children.