No nation can survive without education of her children. Children are the fountain of nation building. A nation without educated children is thus doomed to fail. Unfortunately, in Ghana, though the government is attempting to ensure that the children receive education, the following article posted on the web is not encouraging and hence the government has to double her effort to correct the situation:
"Public Agenda (Accra)
October 14, 2005
Posted to the web October 17, 2005
Accra
A survey by the Ghana Education Service (GES) has found that 56,596 girls
between the ages of six and 11 in the Central Region were out of school by April
this year.
Mrs Justina Torjagbo Central Regional Director of Education who disclosed this
said the number was high and stressed the need for more interventions such as
identifying areas and communities where such problems were prevalent to meet and
counsel parents to address the issue.
Mrs Torjagbo, was speaking at the launching of communication materials such as
posters, brochures and stickers with inscriptions "send your girl child to
school", to promote girl child education in the region, at Cape Coast on
Tuesday. She said although establishment of the Girl Education Unit had made 'great
improvement' in terms of advocacy and community mobilization, a lot more needed
t o be done to attain gender parity in education.
Mrs Torjagbo commended district girls' education officers for working hard to
mobilize more girls in their communities into the classrooms but noted that
although this had been successful they needed to work harder to get the rest in
school by the end of the year. She therefore, urged stakeholders to assist to ensure that provision of the communication materials, by UNICEF in collaboration with the Girls' Education Unit of the GES made the desired impact.
Under the second component of the Poverty Reduction Strategy Credit (PRSC 111)
the World Bank's Board of Executive Directors on September 16, 2005 approved
US$125 million credit for the implementation of the poverty reduction strategy.
Areas to be tackled include education, health etc. The World Bank specifically
asked that particular attention be paid to education in the four most deprived
regions-Northern, Upper East and West and Central regions.
Last two weeks, the National Development Planning Commission (NDPC) released a
final draft of its Growth and Poverty Reduction Strategy (GPRS 11), which
highlights the need to increase access to and participation in education
training at all levels. It also aims to bridge the gender gaps in access to
education in all districts.
The GPRS 11 document says that in the case of education for all, "government has
undertaken not only to meet the numerical targets of the MDGs but also to put
the lost quality back into the basic education that is offered to children in
deprived and rural areas." But the large number of girls in Central Region and
other parts of the country, who are not in school, suggest that the educational
targets are not being met.
It is expected that the latest World Bank credit will be used to target
these unfortunate girls who are dropping out of school due to poverty.
Document Title: 57,000 Girls Out of School in Central Region
Document Source: Public Agenda"
We realize that the above situation is a major problem. The solution will involve a strong involvement of the parents of the children, the community and the government. In the long run if these children are not educated, they would become a liability to society. The nation also loses a major source of work force to help fuel its economic progress. It is with this in mind that I have started blogging on these issues so I can stimulate discussions and solutions to some of these major pressing issues in Ghana.
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