President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo- Addo, says government has planned to formulate a policy that will enable teachers buy houses, to guarantee their security when they retire from active service.
He said the policy, which would include teacher licensing, that is aimed at professionalising teaching to bring it in line with international best practices, was government’s intention of placing teachers at the center of all educational reforms.
Preseident Akufo-Addo gave the assurance at a durbar to mark the celebration of the 70th anniversary of Prempeh College, in Kumasi, on Saturday.
The Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, former President John Agyekum Kufuor, a past student of the school, joined students, tutors and other invited guests to celebrate the event.
Other personalities present were Minister of Education, Dr Matthew Opoku Prempeh and Ashanti Regional Minister, Simon Osei Mensah.
President Akufo-Addo indicated that government was committed to ensuring quality and relevant education that would produce confident, skilled citizens, fully vexed in technology to be able to compete with their counterparts anywhere in the world.
He enumerated the rolling out of new curricular for Kindergarten and Primary levels of education in September this year, the overhaul of school inspection and accountability system as well as technical and vocational training regimen as educational policies intended to reform the sector.
President Akufo-Addo advised final year Senior High School (SHS) students to make good use of the past examination questions (papers) procured for them.
He said that they had a great responsibility in making sure their final examination results came out positive next year, as he indicated that there were some powerful political actors praying for the failure of the Free SHS policy introduced by his government.
” Seventy years of existence is worthy of commemoration, and I wish Prempeh College many more years of continued educational excellence, in service to God and country,” President Akufo-Addo said.
The Minister of Education, Dr Prempeh, also an alumnus of Prempeh College, defended the procurement of past questions for the final year students, stating that, “you cannot write external examination without having an appreciation of the questions set before”.
Touching on teacher reform policies, he said, government from the beginning of December this year, would award contracts for the construction of 124 hostels, classroom blocks and lecture halls for the 46 colleges of education.
According to Dr Prempeh it was the largest infrastructural expansion in the colleges of education that was needed so that teachers came out from training better motivated, trained and ready for the job at hand.
He said government believed that motivating teachers would enable them work to improve the quality of students.
The minister said government would continue to support education, to ensure that the poorest were not left out because of financial constraints.
FROM KINGSLEY E.HOPE, KUMASI
