In recent weeks, the Institute for Energy Policies and Research (INSTEPR) has been engaging teachers and stakeholders in the basic education strata of our education system. Our findings are very disturbing, and we want to deviate from our usual reports in the energy sector and look at this all-important subject of basic education in Ghana.

In 1995, the government introduced Free Compulsory Universal Basic Education (FCUBE) Program. Every Ghanaian child of school-going age is assured access to high-quality basic education. The laudable program has one fundamental flaw, ‘quality of education'.

During the Post-independence era the quality of basic education in Ghana was very high in government schools. Children of the rich and poor all attended government primary schools. The middle class and civil servants did not have to worry about high school fees since education at the basic level was very affordable and of high quality.

Today, to send your child to government primary school means you are poor or live in the rural parts of Ghana. Parents must find money to pay exorbitant fees charged by private international schools across the country. The quality of education assured by FCUBE is now a mirage.

UNICEF on their website under challenges in Ghana education states; ‘’ The school environment is usually not conducive to learning. Classes are overcrowded, water and sanitation facilities are inadequate and trained teachers and schoolbooks are in short supply. The poor quality of education is reflected in students’ results’’.

In 2019, the Ghana Education Service (GES) introduced a standards-based curriculum at the primary schools thus from kindergarten to primary six. After the introduction of this new curriculum, a survey report in the International Journal of Education and Research Vol. 9 No. 3 March 2021, showed that teachers had two main concerns. 

1. Lack of information about the new curriculum: The report stated that majority of the teachers who are the users of the standard-based curriculum, would like to have more information about what it entails and what it will do.
2. Resources: Resources are essential for a successful implementation of the standard-based curriculum.

Three years after the introduction of this new curriculum, most primary schools across the country have not received test books. The teachers are supposed to teach ICT without books and computers. Some children in rural Ghana are learning about ICT without ever seeing a computer before. Things that bourgeois family in the city takes for granted.

My question is very simple, is government serious about basic Education? Surely the politicians, civil servants and technocrats in the education sector have seen the UNICEF data sheet on Ghana through the MISC-Education Analysis for Global Learning and Equity initiative.

The 2021 data sheet is very disturbing: For Grade 3 (8 -9 years), Reading Skills is 7% and Numeracy skills is 8% for children attending government schools. Simple English, only 7% of all children between age 8 and 9 attending government school in Ghana can read. This reduces to 4% for Grade 2. This data sheet also highlights the disparity between education in rural and urban Ghana.

In recent months we have seen a new government initiative called STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) education) and new STEM schools to be built. INSTEPR will advise government to put this STEM project on hold and address the fundamental problems with existing basic schools in the country, providing test books for all pupils.

Instead of STEM, government should put more resources to develop early childhood education. Research in multiple countries has shown that 95% of children in early education, 3- to 4-year-olds, progress as expected for their age in learning and areas of physical and social-emotional development. Donor agencies like USAID has been helping the government produce reading materials for early education because the USA has seen the benefit of early childhood education.

As a country, we cannot continue ignoring basic education and most importantly neglecting basic school infrastructure at the rural level. Free education is a wonderful policy and we Ghanaians are blessed to have it but what is the quality of the education which is free?

Students are struggling to comprehend secondary school education especially now that it is less than 3 years. There is a vast disadvantage for government school students because their private school counterparts have a very good basic education.

We all know that the government has limited resources but that does not excuse anyone not to make a systematic effort to bring back quality of education to government schools. Invest in the infrastructure and teachers as well as supervision.

Parents of all walks of life can take their kids to government primary school to reduce the financial burden on these parents. The current situation is unacceptable and INSTEPR is calling on government to act now.

Signed

Kwadwo N. Poku

Executive Director

Institute For Energy Research and Policies