Deputy Minister of Education in charge of pre-Tertiary Education, Dr. Yaw Osei Adutwum has cautioned headmasters/headmistresses of various Senior High Schools’ [SHS] not to prevent any first year student posted into their schools from schooling.
According to him in a press briefing, any headmaster who goes contrary to the directives of the Ministry as far as the free SHS is concerned will squarely face the laws of the state.
He reminded that with the free SHS, aside tuition and feeding fees, it includes other free charges “students are not supposed to pay any fees, as a matter of fact our PTA dues, utilities fees, development levies and even teacher motivation fees are going to be paid by the government. As a result we have made you abundantly clear that monies should not be the reason why a student does not go to school, therefore ‘No’ student should receive bills.”
"If PTA meet and decides in consultation with Ghana Education Service [GES] that there is something they want to do and want parents to contribute to it, it will not be mandatory if for example Mr. Kwadwo Mensah does not have money to make that contribution for his/her ward, the student will not be prevented from going to school. So this is where we are in terms of Free SHS, and I think at this time I will say we are at a good place," he said.
Ghana Education Service recently announced the posting of over 400,000 BECE candidates to various Senior High Schools across the country through the Computerized School Selection Placement System.
It mentioned that over 36,000 students were not placed due to their failure in either English or Mathematics.
The GES subsequently has asked qualified students who were not placed to go online and select an option available within the time frame given to them.
Speaking with respect to how far the placement system have gone, Dr. Osei Adutwum said “Our server may be overwhelmed, so as I speak with you we have acquired new servers making sure that there are back-up plans . . . "
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