Postgraduate Studies In Ghana Too Expensive - GRASAG Cautions Gov't

Samuel Ekow Sagoe, GRASAG-NATIONAL President Elect

The newly elected national executives of the Graduate Students Association of Ghana (GRASAG-NATIONAL) led by the President-Elect Samuel Ekow Sagoe has asked government to pay much attention to postgraduate studies and research.

He said postgraduate studies have increasingly become too expensive to bear in Ghana by the ordinary students therefore it accounts for the exodus to abroad by many of our youths for further studies.

"We have students in Ghana who are paying GH¢16,000-¢20,000 a year just to acquire postgraduate studies. This is very harsh and unbearable to the ordinary postgraduate students. As a nation if we dedicate special funds to postgraduate studies and quality research work it will have multifaceted benefits on our economy," Mr Sagoe stated.

He continued, "I have a lot of friends who are doing postgraduate studies in Australia and if they tell you the incentives attached you'll be marvelled because their government belief that research brings about innovation.

"In Ghana, we've done most of our research to solve problems we have in our communities but does governments even care because most of our social interventions come from postgraduate research studies".

Samuel Ekow Sagoe, the GRASAG-NATIONAL President Elect used to the occasion to call on the Scholarship Secretariat to as a matter of urgency release the postgraduate students bursary and tasked government to increase the paltry amount given to postgraduate students as bursaries for their research work.

Contributing to the discussion about the way forward, the GRASAG-NATIONAL Secretary-Elect, Kwasi Frimpong said, "we as newly elected executives want to increase the availability and access of funds to the ordinary graduate student to facilitate quality research work and completion on time."

He added, "We take this opportunity to announce the upcoming launch of the GRASAG Research Fund and we appeal to corporate organizations, the government, ordinary citizens, NGOs to help contribute their quota towards funding to enrich and enhance postgraduate research studies.

These discussions took place during the youth empowerment programme on Pan-African TV hosted by Abena Broni.