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The Education Minister, Dr. Matthew Opoku-Prempeh, has said trained teachers who have passed their licensure examination after their National Service would only be employed based on declared vacancies.

“Those who passed the licensure exams at the end of their National Service shall then apply to the Ghana Education Service for employment based on declared vacancies,” he stated.

Dr. Prempeh disclosed this in response to a parliamentary question filed by the lawmaker of Akatsi North, Peter Nortsu-Kotoe.

Mr. Nortsu-Kotoe was seeking to know from the Education Minister steps being taken by his ministry to absorb all privately trained teachers into the education sector as done by the Ministry of Health.

In a direct response to the question, Dr. Prempeh admitted he did not know what pertains in the health sector, nevertheless, he went ahead to state that a total of 14,160 trained teachers from the Colleges of Education, both public and private, were posted by the Ghana Education Service (GES) in 2017.

This was made up of 11,733 from the public colleges and 2,427 from the private colleges. The private colleges involved were the Methodist College of Education, Akim Oda, 54, Jackson College of Education, Kumasi, 2084, Christ The Church College of Education, Kumasi, 46, ad Cambridge College of Education, Kumasi, nine.

The rest were St Ambrose College of Education, Dormaa (which has since been absorbed by the public education system), 31, Holy Spirit College of Education, Ho, 92, McCoy College of Education, Nadowli, 86 and SDA College of Education, Agona-Ashanti, 55.

“Mr. Speaker, this was the first time ever that graduates of private colleges of education were directly posted by GES,” he stated.

The recent move, he said, followed a reminder to the GES of the National Service Act, which requires graduates of all tertiary institutions to undertake national service before seeking formal employment.

“As a result,” he said, “all graduates of colleges of education, including those from public and private, were registered by the National Service Secretariat and in collaboration with the Ghana Education Service to undertake their national service, which they are currently undergoing,”