Professor of Political Science at the University of Ghana, Prof Ransford Gyampo, says the massive failure of candidates in the teachers licensure exam is likely International Monetary Fund (IMF) conditionality.

He said Ghanaians must not be surprised by reports of over 6,000 candidates failing when the Fund has a conditionality of a public sector recruitment freeze to help Ghana out of its economic crisis.

Prof Gyampo told myjoyonline.com that "government as part of its proposals to get assistance from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) indicated that there would be some moratorium in public sector recruitment."

This according to him, "must be factored as part of the explanatory variables of the mass failure in the licensure exam."

He wondered how "a government that has elected to freeze recruitment to the public sector would support the churning out of over 6000 teachers who would also put pressure on the public purse."

Prof Gyampo said those judging candidates who failed the licensure exam must be careful not to discourage them.

He said Ghanaians should approach the issue with "caution and trepidation in order not to discourage and insult those who seek to be part of the noble profession of teaching."

Apart from this, he added, "Many of the prospective teachers ventured into the area of teaching not because of their love for the profession but as a sure guarantee against their potential joblessness after school.

Prof Gyampo argued that it cannot be part of the noble profession for teachers to jump into it just because it is the only means of providing quick employment for them.

Teaching, he said, "Is a calling for only brilliant and academically smart people."

In this regard, he argued that those who do not have such a calling must not be allowed to get closer to the noble profession.

Joblessness shouldn’t be the reason why people would get into teaching.

Prof Gyampo finally called for a massive overhaul of the quality of training and teaching at the various teacher trainee centres.

He indicated that some of the centres have simply no infrastructure to carry out what they are set out to do and added that the idea of Distance Education that treats students shabbily must also be looked at again because it also accounts for the problem