MAKE TECHNICAL AND VOCATIONATIONAL EDUCATION A PRORITY IN GHANA ─Part 1
I hold a view that, Ghana's excellence in secondary and primary industrialization rests on the back of her Technical and Vocational training institutions. When President Barak Obama came to Ghana, he said, “Ghana does not need great men, Ghana needs great institutions” (paraphrased), a statement I fully do not agree with because of another context within which I put it. Great institutions do not run on auto-pilots, great institutions are brought into place by great policy makers, great reformers, and are managed by great men. The greatness of any institution is a reflection of the great men or, perhaps, the great principles set by these great men running it. I want to believe that, what Mr. Obama meant by that statement was; our institutions must be built on Godly principles and not around personalities if we will see results.
The fundamental challenges that always lead to Ghana's economic miasma do not necessary emanate from government policies but the mismanagement of these policies which culminate not into workable outlooks that strengthens state institutions and other government structures. There is a need to reform our educational structures and build strong learning and developmental institutions that will force out the inherent abilities, talents, potentials, and more for further development so they can be harnessed and be exploited for the general good of the all. At least, I know that in Ghana students in the Technical and vocational training institutions are accorded little respect. They are considered as 'unsuccessful' within the parameters of what an ignoramus might call quality education. Even, polytechnic students receive little regard here in Ghana, yet apart from adequate theoretical input, practically they are more useful at the job market than many theorists from the Universities who lack practicality in addition to their theoretical expertise. One typical example of such disrespect and de-motivation meted out to these students who are undergoing such vocational and technical training at the polytechnics and the other institution was some years ago, during the NPP administration. A spokesman to the president arrogantly addressed a group of demonstrators from the polytechnics, saying that the students were indirectly venting their frustrations on government for their failure to enter the University. And that they hiding behind the smoke-screen of equality with the university students in terms of relatively small amount of student loans they receive as compared to their University counterparts. As though the Universities students are any better; if they are, why must government privatize state enterprises due to poor managerial skills deployed by management and staff who are supposedly products of the various universities in the country.
There is little motivation given to these students within the Technical and Vocational institutes yet these are the people whose handiwork will creatively and productively craft the manufacturing industry base in the country. These are the people who will add value to our vast resources. As it is known, a nation's standard of living is contingent on the amount of goods and services its working class can produce per hour. This means, a nation's average income is determined by the magnitude of its productivity. How many skilled people do we have in Ghana? What is the use of cheap labor if it is unskilled? Why must I go and invest in a country and spend more money in re-training it's, supposedly, educated workforce? In life people are paid for what they do not what they merely know. This is why many well-trained technical and vocational skill students will readily have jobs to do than many well-trained University students. The later are boasters of their knowledge but the former boast of wisdom and the reason simply because; wisdom is the application of knowledge into relevant areas of one's calling. The controversy is, Technical and vocational skill students are good at what they do whereas most University students are good at what they know and the two are not the same. One might be denied a white-color job and will survive because he has the skills to create his own business but the other might be denied a white-color job and will steal because he does not know how to translate what he knows from the realm of thoughts into actuality. Also, one might gain a white-color job and might easily excel on the papers (theories) and the other might gain the same kind of job and excel on the field, whose practical work actually brings the required results. Now the question is who deserves the promotion? Just a paper work or a paper work in addition to field's work? The reality is that, practical work will always lead to the discovery of theories but the opposite is closer to impossibility. All theories ever propounded by great scientists who ever lived came out from their manifold experiments; they came out from their meticulous observation of the synergy that exist in nature's practical interaction with itself and by such interaction these theories became useful in the creation of the artificial world.
A friend told me a story about a Chinese friend of his, a lady. He spotted an expensive watch nicely locked up around her wrist and enquired of his friend, “Wow! That is a nice watch…where did you get it from?” To his wonder the friend replied, “I produced this myself way back home in China”. This is exactly what I am talking about, right from infancy this emerging giant of South-East Asia are introduced into vocational and technical training to the extent that any additional education they acquire is to make them versatile and not necessarily waiting and depending on government to survive. How many world class restaurants in Ghana are owned by Ghanaians? Chinese restaurants are spring forth like weeds in this country and their food tastes so nice and very expensive. We fail to encourage our caterers; we invest so little in their domain of education. China, South Korea, and the likes are no where comparable to Ghana in terms of diversified resources yet they turn the raw materials they buy from Ghana into finished goods and sell them back to us at a higher cost. At least the cheaper ones we scramble for are within the grade C of their product category. The 'As' and 'Bs' are sent to America and Europe and parts of the Middle-East. When people say Chinese products are not of quality I laugh, of course the grade C is what we can afford and those are exactly what they dump here. If we want quality for our money we must invest, heavily, into the future of Ghana's manufacturing industry; the Polytechnics, the Vocational and Technical training education centers or make our universities true education centers and not 'head-ucation' centers.
FIDEL Y. TETTEH (MODERNGHANA).
Development / Accra / Ghana / Africa / Modernghana.com