The Editor-in-chief of the New Crusading Guide Newspaper, Abdul Malik Kweku Baako, has described the current challenges facing senior high schools in the country as a sign of national failure. The 4-year senior high school system, which has now been reverted to three years, is still in a gloomy state as the Conference of Heads of Assisted Senior High Schools(CHASS) have indicated strongly that admissions into some schools may be impossible due to inadequate infrastructure to accommodate boarding students. President of CHASS, Samuel Ofori Adjei explained to Metro TV’s Good Morning Ghana programme host Randy Abbey Thursday that though the government has initiated the construction of facilities in schools across the country, not more than 10 percent of those facilities would be ready before school reopens. He stressed that CHASS is not suggesting in anyway that nothing is being done about the problem but that the level of readiness on the part of schools to admit students is what poses a challenge. Mr Ofori Adjei cautioned that it would be imprudent to admit students into schools when there are no facilities to house them and when construction works are ongoing, especially at a time when the facilities are at different stages of completion. He said CHASS is going to propose to the GES and the government that first-year students be allowed to go for their admission letters and prospectus, go home to prepare and report to their various schools by the 1st of November, 2010, hoping the suggestion would be approved by the authorities. Meanwhile, Mr Kweku Baako, on the same programme, said he has nothing to add to the discussion because for the past two decades, all that Ghanaians have been able to do about the state of education is to articulate the problems but have failed to provide solutions. “What else can I add to the discussion that experts and people who are policy makers have not said or claimed to be doing and yet we are back to square one? So I come and sit here this morning and lament and lament … but the lamentation won’t help,” Malik Baako professed. He however reminded the government that though the problem with the education system may extend even beyond the Fourth Republican framework, the responsibility today lies at its doorstep and that they must meet the challenge. The Member of Parliament for Abokobi/Madina, Alhaji Amadu Sorogo, a co-panelist on the programme, called on the government to request the Metropolitan, District and Municipal assemblies to assist heads of schools to improvise and meet the challenge. “We cannot run away from it, we need to tackle it," the Abokobi Madina MP said, adding that “it’s an abnormal period and we need abnormal solution.” Alhaji Sorogo however assured Ghanaians that this problem would soon be over – in a matter of two-years – and a lot more facilities would be available to admit and accommodate more students into senior high schools. By: Dorcas Efe Mensah/myjoyonline.com/Ghana