WORRYING SIGNALS FRO CHASS (SEPT 24, 2010)

GIVEN the information era we live in today, secondary or high school education is imperative. This is because products of the nine-year basic education the country operates now can hardly measure up to the challenges in this era of information technology.
The first point of solution, therefore, is secondary or high school education, which provides some appreciable level of skills training and knowledge to broaden the outlook of people to face life in a more meaningful manner.
That is why it is worrying when hiccups in the high school system are allowed to become major challenges that call for huge resources for their solution.
Just two days ago, the President of the Conference of Heads of Assisted Senior High Schools (CHASS) pointed out a number of challenges facing Senior High Schools in the country (See front page of Daily Graphic of Thursday, September 23, 2010). The challenges include lack of residential accommodation that would prevent some schools from admitting boarding students.
Some schools also do not have libraries and science laboratories, yet it is common knowledge that science must be practical and it is the laboratories that can help in that sense.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Education is asking heads of Senior High Schools to improvise in order to admit all the qualified students offered admission to their schools.
But the CHASS President, Mr Samuel Ofori-Adjei, says “the stark reality on the ground is that in some schools, there is nothing available to improvise from”.
Mr Ofori-Adjei’s position gives the impression of a very bad situation, but the DAILY GRAPHIC wishes to appeal to CHASS to allow the issue of improvisation to give CHASS members an opportunity to see what they can do in the circumstances to improve high school education.
In the same vein, the Ministry of Education and, for that matter, the government should be swift in organising some resources, financial, material and human, and go to the aid of the high schools, all of which now appear to be needy.
Considering the fact that education plays the most important role in the progress and development of the country, the DAILY GRAPHIC wishes to state that this is the time to look at issues concerning education in a strictly non-partisan manner.
For when our education system fails to produce the right quality of people to run the affairs of this nation, we would have to use our limited resources to hire the services of more foreign consultants and other professionals than the current numbers to run the affairs of state on our behalf. That would be highly devastating and the ramifications are obvious.
The DAILY GRAPHIC, therefore, calls on all stakeholders — the government and minority, heads of schools, parents, non-governmental organisations, chiefs, public-spirited individuals and organisations — to move swiftly and in a non-partisan manner to help solve the challenges facing education.
Those who can donate money, building materials and the like should do so, and promptly for the government alone, it is now clear, cannot shoulder the education burden.
The DAILY GRAPHIC believes that “to improvise” can mean more than just making do with what is available; it can also mean exploring avenues for help and we think this is what the Ministry of Education wants to imply.
And that is why all stakeholders should support the “improvisation call”.