GTEC working to fast-track accreditation process
The Ghana Tertiary Education Commission (GTEC) is working assiduously towards fast-tracking the entire accreditation process for tertiary institutions, acting Director-General, Professor Ahmed Jinapor has said.
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“In fact, GTEC is coming up with several programmes and measures that would quicken the accreditation of academic programmes for tertiary educational institutions to meet the required standards,” he stressed.
Prof. Jinapor noted that as part of the measures to decisively deal with issues associated with the accreditation process, the organisation was organising training for important players, especially in the health delivery educational architecture.
AGM
He was responding to a concern by health training institutions on the cumbersome accreditation process while speaking at the opening of the 16th Annual General Meeting (AGM) of the Conference of Heads of Health Training Institutions (COHHETI) in Bolgatanga last Tuesday, October 24, 2023.
The six-day conference was on the theme “Quality assurance and accreditation in the training of healthcare professionals: The anchor for quality training”.
Prof. Jinapor acknowledged the frustration institutions went through as part of the accreditation process and said, “As a commission, we are doing everything possible to ensure a smooth process for institutions to get their accreditation certificate”.
Highest standards
He stated that in today’s world where the well-being of individuals depended on the competence and skills of healthcare professionals, ensuring the highest standards of education and training was not just a matter of choice but a normal imperative.
Prof. Jinapor noted that the quality of healthcare education and training was the cornerstone upon which the foundation of any nation’s healthcare rested, saying, “It does not only affect the lives of individuals but also determines the overall well-being of the society”.
“In developing countries such as Ghana, where healthcare resources are often limited, the need for high-quality training of professionals is even more critical, since it solves the human resource challenge of the healthcare system,” he added.
Prof. Jinapor stressed that it was imperative that those who aspire to become health professionals receive education of the highest quality to ensure that they are adequately prepared to meet the challenges and complexities of the healthcare system.
On accreditation, he indicated that it was not a simplistic exercise of certification but a formal recognition by an external body when an institution’s programme met specific standards of excellence.
He explained further that quality assurance and accreditation complimented each other in instilling confidence in students, employers and the community as a whole.
Recruitment of more staff
The Head, Health Training Institution at the Ministry of Health, Felix Nyante, disclosed that the ministry had embarked upon an aggressive recruitment of tutors to beef up the staff strength of the health training institutions.
Upgrading
The President of COHHETI, Margaret Mary Alacoque, wondered why the Nursing and Midwifery Training institutions had not been upgraded to degree-awarding institutions, saying, “If other institutions had been upgraded, nursing colleges should be upgraded as well”.
She appealed gfor the provision of official vehicles for each of the health training institutions to ease transportation since most of the vehicles supplied to them eight years ago were not road-worthy.
The Upper East Regional Minister, Stephen Yakubu, also cautioned health professionals to be diligent in handling patients who visited health facilities, as it could lead to preventable deaths.
