Incentive package to entice teachers to deprived areas

Accra (Greater Accra), 7th July 99 --

The Ministry of Education is considering an incentive package, including job security, job satisfaction and the welfare needs of teachers, especially those in deprived areas.

Mr Ekwow Spio-Garbrah, the sector Minister, who announced this in Parliament on Tuesday, explained that the incentives under the three broad areas, would help avoid the tendency to focus on the type of incentive that might not address peculiar conditions in any given situation.

Besides, he said, the Ministry intends to adopt a holistic approach to the issue, using inputs from all stakeholders, including the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT), Conference of Heads of Assisted Secondary Schools (CHASS), religious and non-governmental organisations.

The Minister was responding to a question on what incentive package the Ministry intends to institute to entice trained teachers to deprived areas, especially the Afram Plains District, in view of the poor staffing position of basic schools in the area.

The question stood in the name of Mr Kwakye Addo, NDC-Afram Plains South.

Mr Spio-Garbrah told the House that under the broad incentives, the Ministry intends to address the issues of delays in the payment of salaries, particularly for newly-trained teachers, sustaining the confidence of teachers, opportunity for self-improvement, provision of school infrastructure and timely distribution of supplies and logistics.

He said communities would be empowered to play a major role in the delivery of quality education, through existing structures like district education oversight committees, the parent-teacher associations, school management committees, school governing councils, among other bodies.

He said the Ministry had given approval for the sale of 300 motor cycles and 2,500 bicycles, imported under the basic education sector investment programme credit of the International Development Association (IDA), at reduced prices to teachers, especially those in deprived areas to enhance their mobility.

Payment for the means of transport is to be made by instalments through monthly deductions.

Mr Spio-Garbrah told the questioner that as part of efforts to encourage the retention of teachers posted to the Afram Plains, the Ministry will provide four-unit teacher accommodation blocks in 10 communities in the area.

About a proposal by teachers in the Afram Plains that a "special teachers award" be instituted on circuit basis, the minister said the Ministry would wish that this was discussed first in the district assemblies due to its administrative, organisational and financial implications.

On what plans the ministry has to enable students in private tertiary institutions to benefit from the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) Loan Scheme, Mr Spio-Garbrah told the questioner that under PNDC Law 276 (1992) which established the scheme, only students in public tertiary institutions qualify for it.

"Whichever way one looks at the law, the Minister has no discretionary power in this matter", he said.

He said, however, that there might be the need to amend the law to reflect the current realities on the ground.

Such an amendment would also broaden the sources of students' loans beyond the SSNIT scheme and also provide various criteria for eligibility to focus principally on needy students.

The Minister said the scheme now covers 24 tertiary institutions with a total eligible enrolment of 45,700.

He noted that the scheme as it is being operated now, needs appropriate changes to make it sustainable. He said it was for this reason that President Jerry John Rawlings, in his last sessional address to Parliament, called for a national education fund to raise resources outside the budget to finance all aspects of education.

The minister was asked about what plans the Ministry has to provide St Fidelis Secondary School at Tease, in the Afram Plains, with additional staff accommodation and an administration block.

Mr Spio-Garbrah replied that the ministry had received the request and that it would be processed and included in its investment programme for consideration in next year's budget.

He said the budgetary allocation for the Ministry is inadequate to cater, at the same time, for all requests by the 110 districts for infrastructural development in the education sector.

He announced that for this year, 580 million cedis has been provided in the budget for the provision of infrastructural facilities in the district.

The allocation will go into the renovation of five bungalows, completion of a three-storey boys dormitory, construction of office block and a bungalow for the district director of education at Donkorkrom Agricultural Secondary School.

It will also cater for the provision of water, construction of access road and a playing field, carpentry and joinery and masonry workshop, completion of two bungalows, as well as procurement of teaching/learning equipment for Amankwakrom Fisheries and Agricultural/Technical School.

GRi?/