Sex scandals in SHS: Blame school heads for poor supervision - Dr Fokuo Kwarteng

The Head of Entrepreneurship and Finance Department at Kumasi Technical University (KSTU) Dr Solomom Fokuo Kwarteng has attributed the high rate of indiscipline as well as Sexual abuses amongst teachers and students to the laxity in the enforcement of rules and regulations by Heads of Senior High Schools (SHSs).

He said the Ghana Education Service has rules and regulations that govern the behavior of both students and staff and that school Heads have to be vigilant and apply appropriate punishment and sanctions fairly and to the letter, on offending staff to help maintain discipline and reduce incidents of sexual abuse in their schools.

According to Dr Fokuo Kwarteng, the desire for accomplishing quality education is in the hands of educational leaders who are duty bound to ensure that all members of the group live up to expectation in performing their professional duties.

The Ghana Education Service (GES) on Thursday July5, 2018 terminated the appointment of four teachers of the Ejisuman Senior High School in the Ashanti Region, for sexually abusing some female students.

This followed the recommendations by the Ashanti Regional Education Directorate Disciplinary Committee which investigated allegations of sexual harassment against the four teachers.

The four teachers, Isaac Amponsah, Moses Asmah, Murphy Osei and Andrews Adu-Asare were said to have sexually harassed some female students.

Relatedly, four other teachers are to sign a bond to be of good behaviour. They are also to be transferred from the school for misconducting themselves professionally.

Speaking on OTEC FM’S weekend edition of Breakfast show, ‘Kejetia’ on Saturday July 7, 2018, Dr Fokuo Kwarteng called on the Heads of Senior High Schools (SHSs) to protect female students who are victims of sexual abuse by teachers in Senior High Schools across the country.

He expressed worry over the failure of some heads of schools and Directors of Education in taking steps to protect female students who are victims of sexual abuse and asked that heads of various institutions should act in place of parents and must ensure the girl child is not a subject of sexual abuse.

“Though they are allegations, they are not allegations that should let us sleep, the school authorities must be hold responsible. If such an incident happens in your school and you don’t take steps to protect the kids, it is not about sacking the teacher, it is not about anything, it is about taking steps to protect the underage children”, he told the programmes’ host Nana Kwabena Agyemang, aka ‘Agyengo’.

He was of the view that proper supervision is the general leadership role and a coordinating role among all school activities concerned with learning, therefore, monitoring what teachers do including all classroom activities can only be said to be effective if it achieves its avowed objectives of quality instructional delivery.

‘’How can only a teacher and a female student be in the teachers room in the pretext of one on one teaching be without proper regulations be allowed in certain schools,? This is massive temptation for some of the students and teachers and must be stopped immediately to minimize sex scandals’’, he said.