Govt only focused on public schools in decision making – Private Schools Association

The Ghana National Association of Private Schools has said the decision by the government of Ghana to cancel the remaining part of the 2019/2020 Academic Year was made largely with focus on public schools.

According to the association, the decision has more dire consequences on the private education industry which has been hit with a lot of hardship since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Government has placed the first years and second years on the Double Track System, government knows that putting them together will be problematic. Because of that government has decided that across board only second years (JHS and SHS) should go just because government lacks facilities to contain first year and second year students in public schools. The consequences have been transferred to us (private schools) who have the facilities to contain the first and second years. If we bring back our second years and maintain our teachers who we will be paying to teach them, that will bring us more hardship,” Public Relations Officer of the association, Mr Kyei Baffuor said in an interview with Okay FM on Tuesday morning, monitored by GhanaWeb.

On Sunday August 30, 2020, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo Addo announced the cancellation of the 2019/2020 academic year for Senior High, Junior High and Basic Schools across the country.

The president however announced that form 2 Senior High and Junior High school students were to resume schooling between October 5 to December 5 to complete the academic year.

“The Ghana Education Service, after further consultations, has decided to postpone the remainder of the academic year for all nursery, kindergarten, primary, JHS 1 and SHS 1 students. The next academic year will resume in January 2021, with appropriate adjustments made to the curriculum to ensure that nothing is lost from the previous year. The relevant dispositions will also be made so that the presence, at the same time, in school of all streams of students, can occur in safety.”

But reacting to the president’s announcement, the PRO of the Private Schools said it would have been better if in their case, first year students were in the least allowed to join their immediate seniors in school.

According to him, private schools unlike public schools across the country can boast of enough infrastructure to accommodate the students while observing all the outlined health and hygiene protocols.

“We will plead with government, if reopening can only be made for second year students in public schools for us, we do have the facilities. They can come and inspect them and allow our first and second years to come and finish the academic year so that we can focus on the next year after that. If we all want to move along let’s work in tandem, private schools are not competitors of public schools. We are partners, we complement where governments efforts cannot reach. So government can as well send the excess numbers it has to some of our facilities so that they can all complete the academic year together,” Mr Baffuor said.