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I have seen a post on TV3 Ghana’s X handle with the above-mentioned title and an image of some secondary school students who appear to be writing an exam and an inscription “Ghana’s Secondary Education ranked 137 out of 167 countries in the world”.
The inscription, without any clarification, which is according to the Legatum Prosperity Index 2023, is clearly an attempt by TV3 to make a mockery of the investments and gains chalked in Ghana’s secondary education.
With the media house’s mischief gaining traction with over 158,000 views, 275 reposts, 97 quotes and 2041 likes in less than 12 hours, it is imperative to clarify the ranking and put it into proper perspective.
From their website, The Legatum Institute states that “The Legatum Prosperity Index™ is a tool for transformation, offering a unique insight into how prosperity is forming and evolving across the world. Leaders around the world can use it to help set their agendas for growth and development”.
From this statement, it should not be lost on anyone that the ranking in itself is not absolute. It is the progress over time that matters in “setting an agenda for growth and development”.
To begin, it is a truism that Ghana ranks 137th in secondary education, according to The Legatum Prosperity Index 2023.
However, a careful scrutiny of the country profile shows that Ghana ranks 118th Globally in Education, an increase of 8 places over the past ten years, putting her 13th in Sub-Saharan Africa.
The constituents of the ranking on Education include Pre-Primary Education, Primary Education, Secondary Education, Tertiary Education and Adult Skills.
For Secondary Education, Ghana has increased her scores from 24.8 to 31.1 over the last ten years, with her ranking also improving from 144th to 137th. Since 2016, Ghana’s scores and ranks have progressed steadily on average, compared to an inconsistent haphazard distribution of scores and ranks in the years before.
This suggests the Ghana Government’s consistent deliberate plan to develop Secondary Education since 2016. Pro-poor policies and interventions such as Free Education, free WASSCE examination fees, free learning materials including textbooks and past WASSCE examination questions; heavy investment in education infrastructure, like the science resource centres, the Science, Technology, Engineering Mathematics (STEM) schools, among others have all yielded fruits.
Indeed, the continuous excellence in WASSCE results is a testament to this. One can only imagine how far the newest policy introduction, i.e. free laptops for students will take the country.
Ghana has made consistent steady improvements post-2016. The worst rank post-2016, which occurred in 2021, is better than the best pre-2016 rank occurring in 2009, 2015 and 2016. On scores, the worst score post-2016 (28.61 in 2017) is also higher than the best pre-2016 (27.25 in 2015).
The above shows a country that is making steady progress in secondary education to rival that found in more advanced countries. It is necessary to mention that, Ghana has improved in all the constituent categories considered in the ranking on Education. For the Pre-Primary Education category, Ghana already ranks 1st globally, with a consistent score of 100.0 for the past 10 years.
One will wonder what the media house really sought to achieve to hoodwink possible gullible readers with a simple statement of rank, without providing enough background. Was it to poo-poo the government’s effort in Secondary Education?
Is it an agenda setting to cause disaffection for the government? If private media houses like TV3 who should be providing superior deep-thinking analytical content are rather engaging in such pedestrian claims and click-bait journalism, then the country is at a huge risk of meltdown caused by media insensitivity and shenanigans.
