Comparing Ghana to Singapore Part II

Education and Training for a Middle Technology Economy. (Part 2 of 3)

Thanks to political stability and her focus on key economic indicators like education today Singapore's government has raised its 2006 growth forecast to as much as 6 percent after the economy expanded faster than economists expected in the fourth quarter on exports of electronics and drugs (Bloomberg, Feb. 16, 2006 online).According to BBC News, in 2004 Singapore's economy grew at a rate of 12.5% in the three months to June from the same period a year earlier. How do we explain this?What lesson can Ghana learn fro Singapore?

Education and Training for a Middle Technology Economy

Like in Ghana, when Nkrumah on attainment of independence sought to reform Ghana?s education, Singapore saw that the inherited colonial education was inadequately developed to meet the needs of the country. However, unlike Singapore, every effort to meaningfully restructure Ghana?s education came to a halt after the 1966 coup. While Singapore was seriously on course reforming her education Ghana was baffling with a clueless military administration in the 1970s. Thus, in Singapore the secondary school system was restructured upon the recommendation of the 1961 Chan Chieu Kiat Commission of Inquiry into Vocational and Technical Education. Four other types of schools (i.e. in addition to academic schools) were created at secondary level - vocational, technical and commercial schools and vocational institutes. The Balestier Junior Trade School was reorganized into a vocational institute in 1964. Nevertheless despite the addition of a technical bias, the secondary school enrolment remained predominantly academic. In July 1968, 83.9% of those enrolled in secondary schools were in the academic stream while 8.1% were in the technical stream, 7.1% in the vocational stream and 0.9% in the commercial stream.

While Ghana (still) puts no emphasis nor importance (or balance) on technical education, greater emphasis is given to technical education in Singapore with the shift to export oriented industrialization which took on greater urgency upon independence. In April 1968 the National Industrial Training Council was formed. Chaired by the Minister for Finance, with the Minister for Labor and the Parliamentary Secretary for Education as members, it was tasked with the responsibility for technical education and training. The secondary school system was again restructured. Vocational schools were phased out. All secondary school students studied a common curriculum in the first 2 years. In addition to general subjects all pupils took technical drawing and all the boys and 50% of the girls underwent workshop practice once a week outside normal school time. The remainder of the girls followed a home economics course. These changes were designed to enable students not only to acquire literacy, numeracy and the ability to deal with concepts but also to introduce manual skills to them through workshop practice. A policy of having one third of the students in the technical stream and the remainder in the academic stream in the upper secondary classes was phased in. By 1972 this ratio had been achieved. The number of secondary four students in the technical stream rose from 1,600 in 1968 to over 7,000 in 1972.

In 1965 the University of Singapore agreed to award degrees to the Polytechnic's professional engineering, architecture and accountancy graduates. However in late 1968, the Government decided that the Polytechnic should concentrate on technician training. Noteworthy was the introduction in 1969 of the new 2-year full time or 4-year part-time Industrial Technician Certificate (ITC). A year shorter in duration than normal programs, it provided basic engineering training to fit graduates into virtually any factory job requiring engineering knowledge and skills after some training in the company. In August 1968 the College's name was changed to Ngee Ann Technical College. New courses in industrial electronics, management studies and institutional management were introduced. By April 1970 the College commenced with only 3 departments - Mechanical Engineering, Industrial Electronics and Commerce. In 1969 the Singapore Technical Institute was set up to provide 2-year full-time technician courses to bridge the gap between the trade courses offered by the vocational institutes and the 3-year technician courses offered by the Singapore Polytechnic and Ngee Ann Technical College.

By 1975 the Polytechnic had produced 2,057 ITC graduates when responsibility for the course was transferred to the Industrial Training Board. In May 1968 the Government approved a grant of S$363,000 to start a Mechanical Engineering diploma course and another S$60,000 as recurrent expenditure for that year. Responsibility for apprenticeship schemes was transferred from the Ministry of Labor to the Technical Education Department of the Ministry of Education. The department sought to improve and expand apprenticeship training. It introduced a 3-year training framework for apprenticeship in selected trade areas. Individual apprenticeship programs were pursued with large local and multinational firms whose manpower requirements were sufficiently large, specific and continuous. Group apprenticeship training schemes were however offered to locally owned small scale industries.

One scheme was established in March 1968 to retrain clerical and other workers expected to be redundant upon the closure of British military bases. A total of 1,749 trainees were trained in skills like turning and fitting, sheet metalwork, plumbing and radio maintenance and repair. The other was the scheme to train welders in 1970 to meet an acute shortage of such workers. The increase in ship repairing following the closure of the Suez Canal, the establishment of the fabrication of oil drilling rigs and its assorted equipment industry to meet the needs of the burgeoning off-shore oil exploration in Southeast Asia and the expansion of the oil refining industry significantly increased the demand for welders. 1,789 welders were trained from 1970 to June 1973. The critical shortage of welders was eased. Manpower training and skills development were stepped up.

In this regard a Skills Development Fund, which was recommended by the National Wages Council, was set up. A levy of 2% of a company's payroll for workers earning below S$750 a month was levied on employers in 1979. This was increased to 4% in 1980. In 1985 the levy was reduced to 2% when the 2% payroll tax was suspended. A year later the levy was lowered to 1%. The salary ceiling for the levy collection was raised to S$1,000 in April 1995 with the levy rate remaining at 1%. The monies from the Skills Development Fund were used to upgrade the skills of workers or to retrain retrenched workers to facilitate economic restructuring. Under its Training Grant scheme, it defrays up to 50% or 80% of the cost of training programs of companies which are relevant to economic development. The number of training places supported by the Skills Development Fund increased from 32,800 in 1981 to 493,338 in 1995. The Fund also assisted companies in the development of company wide training plans. It also supported the setting up of a number of industry-run training centers in industries like textile and garments, hotel, construction, banking and finance, retailers and jewellery. From 1986 the usage of the Fund was changed to training of workers rather than executive and managerial staff. To sustain the accelerating pace of economic growth, immigration laws were relaxed to allow an inflow of foreign workers which by 1973 totaled over 100,000 (out of a workforce of 800,000), most of whom were Malaysians. On the wage front the Government established in July 1972 the tripartite National Wages Council to ensure orderly wage increases.

Why is Ghana still hooked on to the colonial educational legacy which sought to produce manpower for the civil service? Why have the many Educational Reforms of our governments not been implemented or failed to adapt to the changing needs of Ghana? Since independence Ghana has had at least three (3) separate Commissions to reform our education system but we are yet to see some execution. Ghana has neglected her Technical and Vocational education or relegated them to second and third class status/institutions. Ghana?s education needs some significant reforms to reflect the needs of Ghana and it must include promoting and enhancing her technical education. There is the urgent need for some balance between academic (classical education) and technical vocations. According to US Department of State website, Ghana has a large pool of relatively inexpensive and unskilled labor. Yet our government sees the need to build palaces than to invest in Ghana?s education. How does our government hope to attract investors when the nation is not ready to supplement in terms of labor force?

A closer and critical look into Singapore?s infrastructure would reveal the face and vision of Osagyefo to some extent. To this author, Nkrumah?s original vision for Ghana bear direct resemblance to Lee Kuan Yew (except for the PDA)- the Tema and Takoradi harbor, the establishment of GIHOC, the Tema Steelworks, Ltd etc. These seem to have been a very good start for Ghana, yet for reasons inexplicable by the government of Ghana her factories and economic assets are all for sale. What (has) happened to Nkrumah?s industrialization vision for Ghana? [TO BE CONTINUED IN PART 3]