GES directive for Achimota School to accept rasta students disappointing – Angel Carbonu

President of the National Association of Graduate Teachers (NAGRAT), Angel Carbonu is disappointed at the Ghana Education Service for allowing two dreadlocked students aka Rasta to be admitted into Achimota School.

He says the exception granted the dreadlocked students will set a bad precedent.

“I disagree with it. I am surprised and very disappointed that the Ghana Education Service bent the rules for these Rastafarians. When the Ghana Education Service begins to make these exceptions, they create chaotic situations in the school for we the teachers to manage. If you stretch the frontiers of this, you will have problems so they didn’t have to limit it to only Rastafarians,” he said on the Big Issue.

Authorities of the Achimota school had on Thursday turned home the dreadlocked students , asking their parents to cut off their hair or find another school for them.

The news since caught national attention.

But after public outrage, GES says it has directed the school to admit the two first-year students in spite of their dreadlocks.

An official at the GES who pleaded anonymity told Citi News the school had been directed to admit the students .

But Angel Carbonu insisted that the educational authorities got it completely wrong on this score.

“I disagree with it. I am very disappointed in the management of the GES and I disagree with the directive to the school. The students were in the first place not denied admission. What the school authorities just said as a student of the school you can’t have this hair so cut it”, he noted.

On the same show, however, the Executive Director of education think-tank, Africa Education Watch said, the GES’ directive is a step in the right direction.

“We welcome the directive from the GES, and we think that it is consistent with our constitution and our achieving to international conventions and our own educational plan that seeks to ensure by 2020 that every child of school-going age in Ghana completes the full cycle of school in respect of ethnicity, race, gender, religion etc. It’s a victory for our constitution, it’s a victory for our rule of law and a victory for education for all and a pat on all of us to ensure that our education is inclusive and non-discriminatory.”

—citinewsroom