Reaffirming his commitment to Ghana’s Free Senior High School (Free SHS) policy, President-elect John Dramani Mahama has assured Ghanaians that the program will continue while undergoing adjustments to solve its issues.
He said a National Education Forum, which is nonpartisan, will determine its future course. Speaking in an interview with Voice of America (VOA), Mr. Mahama denied that he intended to discontinue the program, as claimed by New Patriotic Party (NPP) leaders during the election campaign.
He declared, “Free SHS has arrived and is here to stay.” “Free SHS will not be eliminated. It was gimmicky and political rhetoric. We will keep it that way. To improve its resources over what they are now, we will secure specialized funding for it. He continued. “To ensure that instructors, parents, and students benefit as much as possible from the Free SHS, we will assist in making it more effective. Addressing more general issues in education According to Mr. Mahama, the concentration on secondary education has neglected basic education, which is why it is so important”.
“We will also examine the elementary school level. Due to our concentration on Free SHS, we are ignoring the basic level, which is causing it to become a significant issue. There are 1.3 million basic-level students without furniture. They don’t have chairs or tables. Because we have been concentrating on the secondary school level, they sit on cement blocks or lie on their stomachs in the classroom,” he said. In order to tackle these issues, Mr. Mahama declared that he would set up a National Education Forum to bring together important players from every industry to assess the entire educational system and create all-encompassing solutions.
To examine the entire education value chain, we will convene a National Education Forum that will bring together all important parties. “Furthermore, we will all arrive by consensus. It isn’t partisan. At the conference, everyone with an interest in education, regardless of background, will be present. To improve the quality of education for the kids, we will also make crucial decisions on how to change it. And so we’re going to examine that,” the president elect said
Secondary school is now more accessible, especially for kids from disadvantaged families. Implementation has been hampered, nevertheless, by issues including packed classrooms, poor infrastructure, and postponed funds.
During the 2024 general elections, the president elect, kept reiterating that the free SHS program has come to stay.
He also mentioned on this occasion that the problems of the free SHS has to be fixed.
