Improving Ghana's education system: moving from the buttom to the top

Ghana’s educational system has come under scrutiny in various discussions on how bad it is doing currently and what can be done to improve it. It seems that there is no end in sight to the decline in our education system largely due to the fact that in this country, everything including education is politicized. It is rather sad to note that in spite of various reforms in the education sector over the years aimed at improving it, not much has been achieved. This nation is endowed with numerous natural resources (Gold, diamond, manganese and cocoa), we still don’t seem to know how best we must utilize it for the benefits of our citizenry. Our leaders over the years have sold our birth rights through bad negotiation for our natural resources to foreigners who only end up depleting it and leaving our localities with these resources in a deplorable state. We cannot continue the mess we have created with our natural resources to our most important resource, our human resource.

It was widely reported in both local and international media that our dear country was ranked last (out of 76 nations) in the biggest global school rankings published by the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development).

 As an educator, this was a very sad moment for me but in a country where newly-recruited teachers sometimes receive their salaries 2 years after posting, it is not surprising. The OECD is a very credible organization as far as measuring education quality in various countries around the world is concerned. We will therefore be behaving like the proverbial ostrich if we cast doubt on this report. So the appropriate question to ask would be what and why are we where we are today? One can assert that the report focused on only Mathematics and Science and could therefore not be a good yard stick to measure the overall quality of our education system. However, I will disagree since it is an open secret that our education system is not in the best of shapes. The recent reportage that some schools in Ghana scored zero percent in the BECE and the fact that only about 60 percent of students who write the BECE gain admission to secondary schools as well as the persistent labour agitation between government and teacher unions over working conditions are ample evidence that our education system is a disaster waiting to happen.

There are a number of reasons why our educational system finds itself where it is now. Notable reasons among them include poor quality teaching professionals, poor state of teaching and learning facilities, inadequate continuous professional development programmes for teachers, poor method of assessment, lack of access to modern digital technology in our schools, poor or non-existing teacher supervision, over-concentration on standardized testing, monetization of our education system, lack of focus on the humanities and the arts and indifferent posture of Ghana Education Service toward teachers concerns. Though a number of measures have been taken in the past to improve the system and make it better, not much has changed. The most recent one was the indication by the Director-General that managers of education would be made to sign performance contract.  The problems continue to linger on, so the question is, “what can we do to transform our education system from its current horrible state to a state that will enable it to churn out products that can compete with the best anywhere in the world?” The following are my recommendations

Raise the basic qualification for teachers

It is rather sad that in this country it is average students who end up becoming teachers instead of our best students. We must make the teaching profession attractive and accept only our very best into it. This will end up having a lasting impact on the quality of graduates we produce. As proverb 27:17 tells us, “As iron sharpens iron”. There can be only one outcome of recruiting our best students into the teaching profession, excellent educators leading to excellent school system and excellent products. As a first step, all teachers in pre and basic schools across the country who hold first degree and diploma in education must be required to upgrade their qualification to a master’s degree within a period of four years after admission into the Ghana Education Service. Having a master’s degree in their area of specialization helps them to be on top of the subject matter they facilitate. Pursuing a master’s degree is an excellent opportunity for teachers to explore their options and to learn more thoroughly about subjects they are passionate about. Most postgraduate degrees in education focus on training students on how to be a good teacher, with heavy emphasis on curriculum, pedagogy, assessment, philosophy of education, and educational technology. Whereas most undergraduate degree just gives students knowledge of a certain subject, master’s in education teaches you how to impart that knowledge to your students. It must be noted that is one thing knowing something and it is another thing knowing how to impart what you know. Advanced degrees in teaching incorporate experience as prospective teachers have an opportunity to teach in a classroom setting, under the supervision of an experienced supervisor or teacher, while pursuing their programme. That way, when they graduate, they will have a deeper understanding and appreciation of what it takes to become a teacher.

Abolish private schools

Private schools in Ghana are contributing a lot to our educational system but these days most of them are losing focus from being institutions where students are trained to acquire knowledge to think for themselves and make meaningful impact in their societies to pure money making ventures. There has been massive increase in the number of private schools in Ghana over that past few years but some of the founders of these schools know next to nothing about education. A lot of these schools do not recruit qualified teachers but instead, fall on pupil teachers who are underqualified to teach children in their formative stage which is a very important stage in the development of a child. Most of them resort to the use of pupil teachers because they don’t want to pay good salaries. They charge parents outrageous fees but pay the teachers very paltry sums as salary. This results in teaching staff who are de-moralized and under-motivated. Another strong reason we should abolish private schools is that if all public officials and executives in high positions were forced to educate their kids through the national schools, they would be compelled to do all within their means to make the school system better. However, what we see is that most state officials send their children to expensive local and foreign international schools which are equipped with state-of-the-art facilities and use curriculum that are different from the ones used by the national schools. This makes them care less about the state of schools in Ghana.

Overhaul the national curriculum

Though the world is changing at a lightning pace, we seem not to be bothered by the state of things as far as educating our human resources is concerned. Most education systems the world over are transforming their curriculum to meet the needs of the industry and current trends. However, Ghana seem to be still immersed in the 19^th century approach to teaching and learning which puts a lot of emphasis on the old-school information consumption and regurgitation. Whiles new technologies have been introduced and integrated into the classrooms and schools systems in general in some countries in order to revitalize it and help produce out globally competitive graduates, we still continue to use the Prussian system whose basic is to teach basic technical skills such as reading and writing. When someone from the 19^th century comes alive today, there are many areas that this person may note marked improvements in except for education because in most schools that situation in the classrooms remains the same. Most schools lack basic amenities such as electricity and broadband internet to enable them capitalize on power of digital technology to enhance the learning experience and enable students discover new learning possibilities that were not available to them before. Like I noted in a my previous article (The true essence of education), government must extend electricity and broadband internet access to every basic school in Ghana and equip all classrooms with projectors and other modern computer technology equipment to make the teaching and learning process exciting and less enduring. How can this be financed? I propose we dedicate a portion of our oil resources do this. In my opinion it will be the best use we can put revenues from our “black gold” to. There are many examples of countries who have taken this path and achieved success and if we are to get our priorities right as a country then this should not be difficult for us to do.

Incentivizing Education Staff

Teachers are pivots around which the whole educational process revolves. Therefore if an educational system is in shambles, clearly teachers have a key part to play in liberating it. Unfortunately, teachers in Ghana are some of the lowliest paid employees, with some earning less than $300 dollars a month. Due to this, most teachers in basic, secondary and tertiary institutions resort to taking up a second jobs to enable them meet the needs of their families. The resulting effect is poor quality teaching due to poor preparation before class largely because of concentration on private ventures to the detriment of the teaching profession. Hardly would you go to a national school and not see one teacher or the other pursuing students with products such as toffees, ice cream etc. Some even resort to a practice of rewarding students who patronize their products with marks.

District education managers must look into this issues and make sure that it is banned and also mete out appropriate sanctions to offending teachers. What government can do in order to motivate teachers is to pay good salaries and on time and offer wards of education staff free scholarships from the basic to the tertiary level. This would lessen the financial burden on teachers and other education staff and enable them to focus on their core mandate which is facilitating teaching and learning. The government can also build affordable two and three bedroom houses for education staff and offer them non-dollar indexed mortgage to lessen the burden of having to take from their meagre salary to build. For a country that has huge deficit in pre and basic school teachers, this is the least we can do to better the live of teachers and enable them to focus on their work.

Improve teacher recruitment processes

Ghana must also improve the teacher recruitment processes and make it more rigorous. The current situation where prospective applicants go through no form of interview before posting into public schools does not argur well for the quality education we desire. What we must seek to do is to let all prospective applicants go through a rigorous screening process led by university professors who are specialized in education and the subject the applicants intends to teach before they are offered appointment and posted to our schools. This means that the whole education service must be attractive and appealing to the youth. What we currently see is an education service which is indifferent to the needs of teachers. This does not make it any easier to attract the best of human resource into teaching profession.

Continuous Professional Development

Apart from new teachers being given six months mentorship by an established teacher, all teaching staff must go through continuous professional development to help them come to terms with modern trends in education in general and their subject in particular. The resulting effect of this is teachers who are knowledgeable in their subject of specialization. This will have a rippling effect on the entire education system since teachers will use the knowledge acquired to help improve pupils’ learning outcomes and standards of teaching. Aside that, it will result in the overall job satisfaction and lead to a wider improvement in the entire school system.

To conclude, it cannot be overemphasized that any country that wants to develop and become a global leader in the 21^st century must take the training of its human resource seriously, Ghana is no exception. We cannot continue to pay lip service to improving our education system and expect that it will improve by itself. The countries which ranked in the top of the OECD rankings (Singapore, Hong Kong, South Korea etc) made deliberate effort over decades to make their school systems better and the outcome is what we see today. The process of improving education to make it competitive is a very slow and tedious one and the results often take decades to be realized but it has always been worth it. It is imperative.

The author is an education consultant and IT, ITGS and TOK teacher at Tema International School. He can be reached on 0200112201 or email at ericampah2003@gmail.com. You can also follow him on Facebook and Twitter.

The Essence of Education

The current educational system the world over which is based on the Prussian model came into being in late 18^th century. The basic aim of the Prussian model was to teach basic technical skills such as reading and writing, but also music (singing) and religious (Christian) education in close cooperation with the churches. In Ghana, the initial aim of education was to educate children that the slave masters had with their African wives and to train people to spread the gospel. A lot has changed since then but our educational system remains the same in terms of what it seeks to achieve. This has resulted in a huge disconnect between the quality of graduate produced and the quality of work force industries require. There has being lots of attempts to reform education in Ghana but no attempts have been made to transform it.

There is a huge difference between these two words; to reform something is to make changes in order to improve it. However, to transform means to make a marked change in the form, nature, or appearance of an institution. This means that all previous attempts made as far as education reforms was concerned were to make slight changes to an already existing system that did not work. It is very clear that this approach to changing education has done little to improve our system that continues to produce dysfunctional graduates. So what must education seek to achieve in the 21^st century?

21^st Century Education

In his book Creative Schools, author and 21^st century education guru Sir Ken Robinson emphasize that education should be about helping kids discover talents and interests that lie within them. He considers this absolutely critical. Secondly it should help them understand the world around them so they can become compassionate and productive citizens. The era where schools were modelled along the assembly line concept where students are grouped according to the date of manufacture (Date of birth) has outlived its usefulness. What we require in the 21^st century is an education system that groups children in terms of their capabilities and helps unearth the hidden talent in each child. Therefore, the one size fit all approach to educating our children only guarantees us a nation of individuals enduring life instead of enjoying life. For this to be realized, key stakeholders such as government, schools, parents and teachers must know the roles and play them well. So what must key stakeholders such as government, schools, teachers and parents do to realize this objective.

Government

Governments over the years have made education in this country a political issue. As the framers of educational policies they should be seen to be neutral. Governments must also ensure that schools are equipped with the right material and human resources. Unfortunately, governments over the years have not helped much. In an era where digital technologies are being used all over the world to get education to the majority of people, broadband internet is still very expensive and a luxury in Ghana. In an era where coding (programming) is considered a right in some jurisdiction to be as important as reading and numeracy, we still continue to lag behind as a nation. Our ICT curriculum in basic schools only end up equipping students with basic computer literacy skills instead of programming skills that have wider application in the world. What our government must do is to ensure that there is electricity and internet access in every basic school in Ghana and also introduce basic programming into the ICT curriculum. By sending broad band internet to our school, students can begin to learn on their own even if there are no teachers physically present. There are lots of massive open online courses on platforms like Khan Academy, Edx, Coursera that can be utilized by students to learn on their own.

Schools

Schools must create the right environment that enables balanced, individualized and creative approaches to learning. In that sense over concentration of the STEM (Science, technology, engineering and mathematics) only seeks to kill the creativity of students with other skills. It is rather sad that most schools in Accra and other municipalities do not have any avenues where students with talent in the creative arts and sports can flourish. When I was in JHS, the teachers in my school ignorantly advised us on which courses we should choose based our scores in class and not based on our talent. This has lead to many of us ending up in professions we do not have passion for. Some educators even create the impression that some subjects are more important than others instead of putting equal premium on each subject. Students who perform well in subjects such as humanities and the arts are not given as much praise as their colleagues who do well in the sciences. Schools must encourage each student irrespective of their talent.

Teachers

The role of the teacher in the education process cannot be overemphasized. Of the four major stakeholders, a good education can still thrive without three of them; government, schools and parents. Therefore education cannot take place without the principal actors who are the teachers whether physically present or online. Teachers are very important to any success story in education since they are at the forefront of the educational system. Unfortunately, what we see in most school systems is that teachers are poorly motivated and disrespected. This has ended up creating teachers who are not satisfied on the job, no wonder most of them end up leaving the profession when they find other opportunities elsewhere. There is the need for schools to do all within their means to keep their human capital which is its most important asset. This can be achieved through regular training to help them improve on the teaching skills and good salaries. The role of teachers as a repository of knowledge is fast changing to those who can help facilitate learning and guide children to learn on their own.

Parents

Parents play an important role in their children’s education; first because they themselves are their first teachers of these children. However, most parents are not changing with the times. They are offering the same advice and approach to parenting like their great grandparents did. Instead of parents to carefully monitor their children and look out for the things they naturally enjoy doing, most parents prefer to impose their chosen careers on their children. What this does to that child is that they go through their entire life doing what their parents wanted and not what they are passionate about. Some parents are so obsessed with money that they hardly spend any quality time with the kids to know their interest. What parents must do is to liaise with teachers to know the talent and passion of their wards and create the necessary environment by means of encouragement, advice and funding to enable them develop these talents. What we rather tend to see is parents discouraging their children from pursuing their passion in certain fields especially the arts. We have all heard about numerous stars of today whose parents used any means including beating them up to discourage them from pursuing their passion to rather go to school and learn how to memorize stuff. I remember an interview where Samuel Osei Kufour, a former Bayern Munich and Blackstars of Ghana defender, narrated how as a young boy he was advised to desist from playing football by his mum but later ended up as one of the best defenders in world football. As a teacher, unfortunately what you  notice when you meet parents is their obsession with marks. I am not seeking to say that parents should not show concern when their kids don’t do well in school but rather what I seek to put across is that you cannot measure a child’s intelligence or how they will turn out in life based on school test. There is a lot more to the intelligence of a child than just basing it on test scores. I will throw more light on ways schools can get the best out of their children in subsequent articles.

The author is an educational consultant and IT teacher at Tema International School. He can be reached on 0200112201 or email at ericampah2003@gmail.com

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