PRESIDENT John Agyekum Kufuor has called on managers of the country’s educational system to develop practical training courses that would make pupils and students innovative, analytical and creative.
This, he stated, would make it possible for educational institutions to produce the required knowledgeable and skilled personnel for the country’s socio-economic development.
“Although the present educational system puts much emphasis on creativity and practical training, which are essential for maintenance of a manufacturing economy, pupils and students are not trained to be creative but mainly cram information for the sake of passing examinations and this must change,” the President stated.
President Kufuor made the call in a speech read on his behalf by the District Chief Executive (DCE) for Kwahu East, Mr Raymond Osafo Gyan, at the second congregation of the Presbyterian University College (PUC) at Abetifi on Saturday.
In all, 105 students, who pursued various degree programmes, were awarded certificates.
The President said the role of education, especially tertiary education, in nation building had become more important than ever before, noting that the country could not obtain the full benefits of education without proper planning.
He therefore proposed that the future direction of the country’s educational development should help address the various challenges facing it.
According to him, areas of specialisation and the content of the syllabi must be re-organised to produce students with the right skills to help the country to move away from primary economy to that of industrialisation.
He added that with the increasing population, the government alone could not continue to be a major employer, a situation which he said called for the introduction of essential entrepreneurial skills in all sectors of the educational system.
“If such skills are carefully imparted at all levels of the educational system, even those who enter into vocations after junior high school by apprenticeship training can be self-employed and be in a position to create jobs and wealth for the country,” he said.
President Kufuor also voiced his concern about the fact that the current educational system did not make it possible for students to adhere to the indigenous culture but rather turned them into aliens in their own country.
This, he pointed out, could lead to a total loss of the country’s essential cultural values among the youth.
“It is for this reason that our educational administrators should find a way of using education to inculcate our cultural values in all those who pass through the educational system,” President Kufuor stated.
On democracy, President Kufuor emphasised the need for education to be used to consolidate the country’s thriving democracy.
He, therefore, called for the introduction of books on the basic principles on which democracy thrived at the basic and second cycle levels to enable pupils and students to appreciate the essence of democracy in the country’s development aspirations.
Advising the graduates, the President urged them to let the moral and social discipline they had acquired from the university reflect in their daily lives to enable them to be “vanguards of the crusade to inject a high sense of discipline among the populace”.
Highlighting some of the educational achievements of the New Patriotic Party under his administration, the President mentioned the introduction of Capitation Grant, the School Feeding Programme, upgrading of a senior high school in each district to a model school, and judicious use of the GETFund for the provision of education infrastructure, among others.
He further said enrolment in public universities had more than doubled from 40,670 in 2000/2001 to 88,445 in 2006/2007 academic year, while that of polytechnics had also increased by more than 50 per cent from 18,470 in 2000/2001 to 28,695 in 2006/2007.
He commended the Presbyterian Church of Ghana for the immense role it had played in the country’s educational development, adding that “the church has never relented in its efforts to partner successive governments in providing the manpower needs of this country”.
The Moderator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, Rt Rev. Dr Yaw Frimpong-Manso, said to complement efforts at making education accessible to all, the church had established over 2000 basic schools, 29 senior high schools, five colleges of education for the training of teachers and a number of vocational and technical institutions across the country.
For his part, the Principal of the PUC, Prof. K. Sraku-Lartey, said since the inception of the university in 2004, it had succeeded in producing graduates who were performing well on the job market.
He, however, mentioned the lack of accommodation for staff and students, shortage of water on all campuses of the institution, inadequate computers and accessories for its ICT programmes and vehicles to ease the movement of staff and students as some of the problems confronting the university.
He, therefore, appealed to the government and individuals to help address such problems.
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