Phase out double track system before 2020 – Government told

The Ghana National Education Campaign Coalition (GNECC) is calling on government to phase out the double track system being currently run under the Free Senior High School policy.

The call was made by the Coalition’s Chairman, Kofi Asare, at the launch of the global action week for education in Accra on Wednesday, April 24.

Mr Asare argued that the implementation of the double track system has negatively affected the quality of the country’s senior high school education.

“Every possible effort must be made by government to ensure that we do not enter next year with the double track, either than that, we will only deepen the existing divide in quality learning outcomes between public and private schools.

“So let’s quickly phase out the double track system, then we can have a system where we can have reduced class sizes, and we can have a relaxed system for teachers to actually engage students in discussions and learning,” he noted.

Other speakers at the event entreated government to improve working conditions of teachers, make technical and vocational education more attractive for the youth and also tackle gender disparities.

He further charged government to take pragmatic steps in addressing inequalities and exclusion in education to improve learning outcomes and also meet the Sustainable Development Goals on education.

The double track system was introduced in September last year to meet increased enrollment in public SHSs across the country.

The implementation of the policy was fraught with infrastructural challenges but government assured stakeholders of its commitment to address all the challenges to make the policy work.