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Mrs. Matilda Amissah-Arthur may have apologized alright for her unnecessary ‘chalk comment’ at Kukurantumi a couple of days ago but the discussion on how government is currently dealing with educational and other related issues cannot easily be brushed aside.

Quality education

The present government does not seem to be appreciative of the real value of quality education and is therefore treating any issue affecting education with non-chalance and pettiness. From the primary level to the tertiary level, government seems to have shirked its responsibility totally- a situation that doesn’t augur well if we really want to push education to a level higher than we are seeing now. The high level of illiteracy is unacceptable; the high level of graduate unemployment is unacceptable and the high level of failure particularly at the basic level is equally unacceptable and we must certainly do something about all these.

Computers

It’s funny, government can give five computers to a primary school but it cannot, in the same vein provide chalk which is very ‘cheap’ in the estimation of the second lady. And when the head teacher of the school reminds her of the need to be provided with chalk because the school didn’t have any, all she got back from her was an acerbic scolding from the second lady. (Someone whispers into my ears that the 5 computers may not be brand-new after all and that they may have been initially donated by an NGO from outside Ghana). Another person has also tweeted that 5 computers for a primary school of more than 100 children is not a big deal and that this was not a task that should have been performed by a person so prominent as the wife of the vice-president of the republic.

In any case, everybody will like to know whether that primary school is connected to electric power so they can turn the computers on and make use of them. Or is it the case that the computers are only meant for ‘propaganda show’ and nothing else? But really, if the school is connected to the electric grid we will like to know who pays the electric bill on behalf of the school but cannot buy common chalk to be used in teaching and learning.

Capitation Grant

Let me say however, that Capitation Grant, when it was first introduced, was meant to be used by heads of basic schools to buy ‘cheap’ school items such as chalk, pencils, erasers, rulers, balls and many other inexpensive but important teaching and learning materials. They may be ‘cheap’ when you break them up into units but when added up, they run into thousands of cedis. So, they may not be cheap after all contrary to the views of the second lady.

The quantum of money for each school depended on the number of children in a given school. It was 35p per a child when it was first introduced and everything went well with this arrangement. All basic schools had their allocation and the head teachers used the money to run the schools. The money per child went up slightly when the NDC took over the reins of government in 2009 and carried on with it for a few years. Things went well until we hit a snag a few years ago.

Basic schools

Regrettably, Capitation Grant has not been given to Ghanaian basic schools for more than two years now and nobody knows what is happening. Head teachers have been complaining all the time about this; parents have also been complaining about this and so have all the bodies representing teachers in this country. It is a fact that most basic schools don’t have chalk, exercise books, pencils, erasers and rulers that are used by the children and registers, log books and note books that are used by the teachers. They don’t have money to buy these things for the schools; they don’t have to use their salaries to buy these things for the school children; it’s the obligation of the government to provide the Capitation Grant for that purpose. It is therefore needless to gloss over this and say there is plenty of chalk and other items in the system. There isn’t anything! Government is not providing the Capitations Grant for that purpose. We are all witnesses to this. Why, don’t we all live in the community and don’t we all have children, nieces, nephews and wards in the basic schools so we know what is happening?

Sandals

The government doesn’t seem to bother at all about this situation. All that the government likes to do is to do propaganda things like giving sandals to famished-looking children in selected areas, giving over-size school uniforms to pupils, cut sod for the building of ‘free’ schools in selected areas but not really caring about what really makes teaching and learning in our schools effective. It is therefore not unexpected when officials of the ministry of education are quoted as saying that there is plenty of chalk in the system and that the case of scarcity of chalk at Kukurantumi was an isolated case. This certainly, cannot be the situation. If there is plenty of chalk in the system all school heads will grab it.

Therefore, the head teacher of the Presbyterian Primary School at Kukurantumi did not do anything wrong by asking government to provide the school with chalk.

Old students

Provision of chalk and other ‘cheap’ items for schools is the responsibility of the government and not parents, not teachers and certainly not old pupils. Blimey! Mrs. Amissah-Arthur is talking about old students of a primary school to provide items for their alma mater? Where did this come from? I’ve never heard about this before—Primary School Old Pupils Association!

This demand for chalk would not have arisen in the first place if the Capitation Grant had been given to the basic schools but that is not the case for inexplicable reasons. All basic schools in Ghana are in this hot soup; they have been left in the lurch for months now.

Secondary schools

Secondary schools, or rather senior high schools, have also not been left out in this harsh treatment of educational institutions by this current government. Throughout the calendar year of 2014 all secondary schools in Ghana, now euphemistically called senior high schools, were starved of funds to run and God only knows how they were able to pay electricity and water bills and how they settled their indebtedness with food contractors. This is extremely weird!

Not only that; senior high school teachers were denied their car maintenance allowance for no justifiable reason. Senior high school teachers were also denied their transfer grant and all pleas regarding this fell on deaf ears. Newly trained teachers who were posted to various places had their salaries held up for more than 16 months for no justifiable reason. In the end the government told them that they would only pay them half of what was due them. Where on earth can this happen apart from Ghana? Also, teachers invigilating WAEC exams were given peanuts for which reason a lot of them opted to be left alone when it comes to exams’ invigilation in Ghana.

Colleges of education

When you climb up the ladder and land on the stage of teacher training colleges, now turned into Colleges of Education you will realize that everything has been made ‘pasaa’ by the current NDC government. Training colleges in the past used to be the haven of students from poor homes. Regrettably, this is no longer the case.

For decades, students from poor backgrounds who wished to continue with their education but had no support from home opted to train as teachers first and foremost where they were given stipends in addition to free board and lodging. After their training, they were bonded to teach at least for five years. While they were teaching they did their ‘O’ and ‘A’ levels and managed to enter university in pursuit of their dreams.

The present government has scrapped this stipend paid to students in training and have rather forced trainee-students to pay user-fees. In effect, therefore, training colleges are no longer a haven for poor students. With this status quo, products from colleges of education will no longer be obliged to teach for even one day as they are no longer sponsored while under training.

However, the government is bent on building dozens of free senior high schools for populist reasons in selected areas and one wonders where we are going to get teachers to man these schools when they are completed. Frankly, all is not well in the educational sector. And one really wonders whether we have an effective minister of education. Quo vadis, Ghana education?