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Parliament petitioned over investment in public basic education

Africa Education Watch, the National Union of Ghana Students and CAPCOE have submitted a petition to Parliament, urging Parliamentarians to advocate increased allocation and investment in Public Basic Education to Improve Quality.

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They in the petition demanded an increase in basic education’s share of the education sector expenditure to 50%, an amendment to the capping of GETFund to at least 50% to free resources for basic education infrastructure provision.

The relevant stakeholders in the educational sector also urged for the need to explore reliable funding to support the construction of 5,403 schools across the country to replace those taking place under trees and sheds.

EduWatch in a post sighted by EducationWeb said the Chairman of the Parliament Select Committee on Education receiving the petition assured them that demands in the Petition would be given priority attention by the House.

The stakeholders among other things have urged the Parliament of Ghana led by Speaker Alban Sumana Kingsford Bagbin and Parliamentarians to add their voice to our call unto the government to:

1. Increase basic education’s share of the education sector expenditure to 50%

2. Amend the capping of GETFund to at least 50% and free resources for basic education infrastructure provision.

3. Explore other reliable funding to support the VALCO Trust Fund in constructing 5,403 schools under trees within the projected 5-year period or less.

4. Explore cheaper technologies in building schools to improve spending efficiency in the education infrastructure space

5. Provide trained teachers in all rural classrooms and strengthen supervision. This should be done by redistributing teachers in over-served schools to under-served ones, and deploying new ones to achieve at least, a maximum of 1:35 Class-Pupil Teacher Ratio in every school.

6. Secure financial resources to construct about 4,000 JHS in all primary schools without JHS within the next five years.

7. Ensure timely disbursement of financial resources required to run these schools.

8. Provide desks, teaching, and learning materials in all public basic schools, especially those in rural communities.

9. Explore the absorption of collapsed private schools into the public stream to enhance access and re-enrolment of students struggling to re-enter school due to their schools’ collapse because of the COVID-19 closure

Meanwhile, the Executive Director for Africa Education Watch, Mr Kofi Asare earlier today following the reading of the 2022 budget urged the central government to reduce the amount to be spent on teacher trainees allowances.

He said the government has already spent over GHC 600 million on teacher trainee allowances since 2017, an amount he noted could be used to build over 1,500 Junior High schools for the over 4,000 primary schools without JHS.

“We cannot transform our basic education if we continue spending hundreds of millions on allowances for teacher trainees who could access student loans, only to deprive poor children of a Junior High School education.

Building Junior High School with this cash would rather open more teaching opportunities for thousands of unemployed teachers,” the Executive Director for Africa Education Watch (EduWatch) said on Wednesday.

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