Employing Teachers For Quality Education Needs Gov’t Commitment

The President has announced in Wa that his government is to employ additional 8,000 teachers for the free SHS policy. He has assured the nation that his government would find imaginative ways to efficiently manage the increasing Senior High School (SHS) admissions, due to the introduction of the fee-free policy.

According to him, over 90,000 students had access to Senior High School education the previous year and that the figure is expected to hit 180,000 this academic year.

Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo said the government was eager to ensure that there quality is not compromised, which is why over 8,000 more teachers would be employed to take care of this additional number of students.

Since September last year, when the government introduced the Free SHS policy in fulfillment of the NPP election promise, the implementation of the fee free SHS has become a major priority on the government's agenda .

Of course, in the pursuit of improving quality of education, teachers cannot be left out of the equation, since they are at the heart of providing quality education and facilitate students’ learning to ensure that they thrive academically as they fulfill their potential and find meaningful careers.

Teachers are at the centre of human capital for national development and, therefore, the role of the teacher in educating our children is of utmost importance.

In 2007, the Education Reform opened a debate on a comprehensive teacher education policy, in which strategies to give a new identity to teacher education were outlined.

It is our believe that the government would not just leave the policies as comprehensive as they are, especially those on teacher development and management that links teachers’ professional development to their appraisal to chance, but strive to let the strategies work to sustain and enhance the production of teachers at the highest quality.

These policies must aim at supporting, developing and rewarding teachers in basic and second cycle schools in Ghana, to enable them function effectively to provide quality education for all Ghanaian students.

Our children, who are the future of our nation, should be educated by the best.

The Chronicle is amused with the commitment of the government to make the fee free SHS policy work more effectively.

The Chronicle is the more pleased about the government's resolve to bring a huge relief to parents, besides creating the opportunity for every Ghanaian child to receive SHS education.

We, however, expect that our teachers would work hard to develop and exploit the innate potentials of our children to contribute to building Ghana to achieve the objective of the policy.

Kudos to the President for his vision on the fee free SHS.