Former President John Mahama has revealed how he will improve the 'Free SHS' as currently being implemented by the Akufo-Addo government if wins power in the 2020 elections.
According to him, though free education is a public good, "it must be implemented in a manner that is sustainable an does not compromise quality".
In this vein, he added, "a new NDC Government will improve the Free SHS programme and make it better."
In a lengthy post on Facebook, the former president went ahead to list four main things he will do to improve the policy if he gets the nod.
HE WROTE:
Education is key to our country’s development.
Free education is a public good, as was demonstrated by my administration. FREE EDUCATION MUST BE implemented in a manner that is sustainable and does not compromise quality.
A new NDC Government will improve the Free SHS programme and make it better.
We will abolish the current shift (double track) system, reintroduce the more efficient three-terms per academic year programme, and bring back the emphasis on skills training, technical and vocational education to provide students with more options, as they go forward with their choices in diverse career and aptitude paths.�
NDC will improve learning outcomes, teaching, teacher development and supervision across all schools.
We will also implement a crash programme to complete all the remaining abandoned Community Day Schools and construct additional ones in areas of high demand to be able to provide increased access and avoid the current congestion being experienced due to the current poor implementation of the programme.
In addition, a National Stakeholders Conference will be organised to bring together headmasters, parents, teachers, educationists, labour, politicians, traditional leaders, religious groups, CSOs, students and others to further review and chart a sustainable course for the implementation of free education for our children and country.
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Hahahahahahahaha, I laugh aaaaa enter Jubilee House washroom. Joke of the century. Come again Mr. Ex-President!
The one who had 8 years but didn't have the wisdom, capacity and the competence to do it and the one who took only 9 months to implement it, who do you think we the citizens prefer? Mahama stop wasting your time.
Mr Mahama!! You had 8 years but didn't have the wisdom, capacity and the competence to do it. Now that somebody has done it you are opening your mouth wide to say these ***barred word***. Nobody believes you
John mahama kwaku ananse story teller, a joker in town now is this john greedy bastard INCOMPETENT corrupt ford bribe taker. NDC YAAMUTU NDC YAAMUTU NDC YAAMUTU NDC YAAMUTU NDC YAAMUTU NDC YAAMUTU NDC YAAMUTU NDC YAAMUTU NDC YAAMUTU NDC YAAMUTU NDC YAAMUTU NDC YAAMUTU NDC YAAMUTU
So initially you said its not possible, and now you are saying you will improve it. So then you’ve now submitted that it has been possible all along , ma fren, stop your nansense, stand aside and let the first man of the land do his job wai
greedy bastard. ignore him. he is not serious. by the way he is not in charge of his social media handles. he cant type anything that will make sense bcos he is always drank. so he has no idea what those managing the accounts are sending out.
John Mahama and the NDC had eight wasted years in government to have held all the consultations on the "better" Free SHS he is envisaging now. Mahama is talking about scrapping the double track system, abolishing the semester system and concentrating on vocational and skills training blah, blah, blah. He wasted eight good years tinkering with the FSHS idea as to whether it should be progressively free or freely progressive. According to Okudzeto Ablakwa, the Mahama administration started their freely progressive or progressively free SHS with scholarships to ten thousand poor students. That scholarship was worth GHS35 per year and they were still in arrears at the time Ghanaians booted them out of power. Mahama is now saying he will review and make better what the NPP administration has put in place. He says he will scrap the interim double-track system instituted to ensure all qualified JSS graduates are absorbed into the SHS schools? He says he will institute a crash program to complete the day schools he could not finish in four years? Out of the two hundred he promised in his last disastrous four year term it is on record that he completed about 32. Every right thinking Ghanaian must start asking following questions: when exactly would Mahama scrap the double track system? Is it before or after he is able to complete his "crash program" to complete those Day Schools he built in the middle of nowhere? If before the completion of his crash program what is he going to do with half of the number of students who would be in one of the two streams? The "excess" number is estimated to be about five hundred thousand in the next five years. Is he going to ask those "excess" number of students to wait home till he completes his CRASH program, deny them their right to equal education, and crash their future with as a result of his indecision? If he is thinking of scrapping the double track system after his crash program to provide additional space and accommodation, will someone whisper to him that the visionary Deputy Educational Minister Dr. Adutwum has already told Ghanaians the double track system is only a temporary measure to ensure no child is left behind whilst government is embarking on the provision of more space in the next five to seven years to be able to accommodate and contain every child that qualifies for SHS in a single stream? Everywhere in the developed countries, the semester system is being used from Primary to the Tertiary Institutions. Public Universities in Ghana used to run the three term system when we were University students. Now they are all running the semester system. Can Mahama's advisors tell him he needs to move out of his political cocoon and be progressive instead of being retrogressive in thinking. Kwame Nkrumah did not build schools everywhere before he introduced his Free Compulsory Education. It is true he added some "Mushroom" secondary schools to those old quality missionary institutions that existed. We carried cement blocks, carted cocoa beans and did other menial jobs then to build our own local Ofadaa-Fianko LA Middle School in the earlt 1960s. Mahama and the NDC should think outside the box, have a little vision to initiate programs that will lift the socioeconomic strata of our people, and quit tinkering with ideas they as recently as 2012 believed would take Ghanaians twenty years to realize. Mahama must be ashamed for promising to "review and make better" an idea so massively laid by Nana Double Track only after the "challenges" are manifest, making necessary interventions clearer to even my last rising senior son.
Aaaaah how disappointing!! Infact now I know this man is bereft of ideas! what is this???...No wonder ALL his campaigns are about finding faults with people's ideas but NEVER propounding what he will do if giving the nod....too bad
Joker
Dear Mr Mahama, how many of the Day Schools were you able to implement within the four and a half years of your rule? Where was the clash programme to complete the day schools when you were president? Or the said programme only emerged during Akufo-Addo's tenure as president? Do you think you are talking to small boys or people with no wisdom. Please give us a break and allow the wise man space to think for us. I hope you have seen the difference between a thinking man and you?