The National Schools Inspectorate Authority (NaSIA) has engaged proprietors of public and private pre-tertiary schools in 12 regions on regulations guiding their operations.

The engagements helped sensitise stakeholders on school establishment procedure, licensing and inspection regimes, and school ownership transition processes.

NaSia seeks to support schools to offer world-class tuition while sanitising the pre-tertiary education space.

"We appreciate the crucial role of education in the country's socio-economic development. Thus, our goal is to help build the capacities of schools to enable them meet the required quality standards to operate," Inspector-General of Schools, Dr. Haggar Hilda Ampadu told stakeholders in the Bono region.

NaSIA, formerly the National Inspectorate Board, is mandated by the Education Regulatory Bodies Act 2020 (Act 1023) to develop, publish, promote and enforce the highest quality standards and guidelines for quality education in public and private pre-tertiary educational schools in Ghana.

Capacity building

The engagements commenced in the Ashanti region in April 2021 and have since traveled across 12 regions.

Participants included directors of education, coordinators of private schools, and proprietors affiliated with the Ghana National Association of Private Schools (GNAPS), Ghana National Council of Private Schools (GNACOPS), Association of International Certification Schools (ASICS) and Montessori Association of Ghana (MONTAG).

Aside from educating stakeholders on the new regulations, the workshops offered the platforms for school owners to share ideas to guide policy implementation.

Despite appreciating the rationale behind the licensing cost, some proprietors appealed to the regulator to consider the impact of covid-19 on their operations in determining the charges.

"The feedback creates the necessary grounds for the adoption of licensing costs that are reflective of diverse stakeholder interests," Dr Haggar said while responding to the pleas.

Inspection and licensing

Since the nationwide sensitization begun, school proprietors have been more cooperative in all the inspections conducted by NaSIA.

The authority has successfully licensed 5,648 schools as of October 2021, with expectations to register more by the end of the year.