Polytechnics To Finally Resume This Week

Some Polytechnics across the country will resume academic work this week after three months of closure. This is according to the president of the Polytechnic Teachers Association of Ghana (POTAG), James Dugrah. The decision to re-open follows government�s decision to pay the Polytechnic lecturers their 2013/2014 book and research allowance after a three-month-long strike. The lecturers withdrew their services a few weeks to the end of the 2012/2013 academic year to demand the payment of their research and book allowance. The decision to strike was informed by government's resolve to scrap the payment of the allowance which would be replaced with a national research fund. However, after deliberations with the Education Ministry and other stakeholders last week, the Polytechnic lecturers agreed to return to work. It is unclear the exact date for the resumption, but James Dugrah said the academic board of all the Polytechnics will meet to agree on definite timelines. �The dates will be rolled out,� he said, adding that some Polytechnics will resume on Monday, September 1 while others will resume on the third week of September. He recalled that before the POTAG strike, some Polytechnics had a week for students to write their end of semester exams while other schools were two weeks to examinations, therefore, the academic calendars slightly differed. Dugrah also told Citi News the management of the Accra Polytechnic has informed the students to return to school and the students of Wa Polytechnic are scheduled to resume on September 8. But all public universities in Ghana are still closed due to the ongoing strike by the members of the University Teachers Association of Ghana (UTAG). The leadership of UTAG is scheduled to meet the Education Ministry and other relevant stakeholders on Tuesday to iron out issues relating to the payment of the research and book allowance.