The Irony of 'free basic education in Ghana'; very expensive

Ghana is blessed to have free basic education for all which has now extended to the Senior High Schools under the 'Free SHS initiative’ by our industrious President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.

These initiatives of free education for the people from basic to Senior high level has received so much attention and applause from even the international community. Ghana is blessed to have equal and free education for all its citizens across the country and this is commendable and awakening to the new reality of empowering the young generation to be resourceful.

What pricks my mind each hour that passes by whenever I stop to think about basic education in Ghana is how expensive the ‘free education’ has made basic education in Ghana. Before now, free basic education ended at Junior High School and as it has always been, is limited to only government controlled schools and the challenges thereof; you and I cannot leap-frog.

Though the government provides free education, but the quality leaves little to be desired by well-meaning parents as it has become a school for the very less endowed. It has the best of teachers, the much trained ones and yet the general output does not give parents the confidence to put their Kids in such schools though they are free and can give them some financial space on their budgets.

This had gone on for long until the parallel system of education emerged, ‘The Private Schools’. Over the years, the private basic education has trained a lot of people and has proven to be better in terms of output and training the young ones. This would not have been the widespread case if education at the basic level was subsidized in some communities by the government, parents would have expected more from teachers, teachers would have given more to earn what they earn and kids would have been more focused as has been the case in the private schools.

Anything people pay for, they expect results and they push their expectations into fruition. But the big question is, in general has the free basic education lived up to expectation? The big answer is NO.

Free education rather made education very expensive as teachers of these free schools manage to put their wards in the private schools where some of the teachers are not trained in our education courses or even in the universities or training collages.

Why? Well-meaning parents who want to track the progress of their kids and wants their kids to progress are pushed to engaging them in the private schools which are also full cost recovery without subsidy. It is seen as a choice but parents are forced to make such choices, whether they can afford or not, they are left with a slim chance to decline.

Would you like your child to attend a government free basic school? I believe most of the answers will be NO and this has resulted to so many corruptions in the country. Some parents cannot afford private schooling at all not to talk of enrolling in the schools that charge exorbitant fees.

Parents are compelled sometimes to do all they can to push their kids through quality schooling, and I mean all in their power and sometimes beyond their power. Free basic education and its deprived state have made true education very expensive. This is not to say that all our government schools are not performing but the general supervision, results, relatively the students that are able to climb to the Apex, among others are unfortunately few.

This is the honest reality, in our part of the world.

Free Education rather made education very expensive and the aftermaths of the Covid-19 came to worsen the plights of parents. This year 2023, the government’s directive to streamline the education to get back to the old track or system, where the academic year begins in September came with huge stress on parents and guardians, as schools are to restructure to go for four terms this year and subsequent four terms fees.

Private school owners are charging same even though the contact hours have changed. The tuition fees are the same, feeding fees are as it were in 2022 where the inflation was at its peak, among others. Books were purchased at the beginning of this year and new books will be purchased by September this year.

Just by a directive, the lives, budget and spending of parents have been redirected. Parents need more money to keep their wards in school while most of the Private schools are having field days now. A typical annual basic school fees is more expensive than an annual subsidized government University fees.

These could have been avoided if the free government basic schools are up and doing which, of course, most of their challenges result from lack of resources.

What does the future hold for us going forward as these resource constraints have now caught-up with the extension of free basic government education to the Senior High Schools. Before now, government subsidised senior high schooling and parents pay for enrolling their wards.

Students who get the opportunity manages to be fed well, learn and sleep under hygienic conditions and tutored by focused and well-motivated teachers, with parents having expectations as they enroll their wards in these schools. Parents prefer enrolling their wards in the Government Senior High Schools because at that level the outputs of their wards meet their expectations, to say the least.

If indeed it was the choice of the parent to patronise private basic schools, why don’t parents continue with such trend but rather enroll their kids in the Public Senior high schools? Parents are simply forced to pay so much because they are left with limited alternatives.

Free SHS is here and the desire of the people have been met, where every child of school going age has access to education which is preferred and desirable, but can our resources that have woefully not been enough at the basic level, forcing parents to patronize private schools with its financial stress, be enough to absorb the huge burden of the Senior High Schools as it is now almost completely free? The challenges that have arisen after some few years of implementation are there for all to see.

Giving equal opportunities to all Ghanaians is our right and I am all for it but what will the future bring considering the challenges of accommodation, feeding, demoralized tutors, inability to control large numbers on campuses, and its intended quality challenges, among others. Will we not in the long run relinquish our right to paying subsidized fees to free SHS and enslave ourselves once again to full cost recovery at the hands of future widespread Private Senior High Schools?

As free basic education has been extended to Senior High Schools, are their challenges going to follow suit and in the long run are parents being led to the point of making a choice whether to join the free government poor SHS or the thriving full cost recovery Private unregulated schools? Can you imagine Prempeh College, OWASS, St. Louise, Aburi Girls, PRESEC, among others being forced to have a reputation like the basic government schools we know because of lack of resources, as they have being forced to yet comply with ‘free’ everything?

We are not there yet but if things do not change, I know I am not a Prophet of doom but what has happened before and is happening now, can happen in future since when the government handled basic, it gave rise to private basic schools springing up and now he is handling secondary the same way he handled basic, private SHS must start thinking and investing, for very soon, we will be forced to bring our wards to the ‘Ashesi SHS’s. (Imaginary Quality SHS’s)

As I said before, if government has stratified the basic schools into Grades and subsidized along the stratified grades, it would reduce his burden, it will give parents loosened choices and avoid the state of forcing most parents to live beyond their means at the very basic level.

Similarly, if the grade A schools survive or is run as it were before, where government offers subsidies and grade B also receives their level of Subsidies and trickles down to Grade C which will take the form we see today (Free), then parents will have affordable choices in the market and the very ones that need education who previously would have been at home can be catered for fully by the government and the desire of the people will again be met without destroying the image of any SHS.

Considering the tertiary level, where parents have choices either training college, Nursing, Polytechnics, Universities, among others and even among the Universities, the Private Universities are expensive and are doing very well but we have an equally competitive government subsidized Universities that create the flexibility the parents need in seeing the wards through to the Apex in education.

This is no one’s fault but rather for lack of resources and hence minds must meet and considerations done to save both students and Parents in the midst of these hard times that will go a long way to save the nation from stress and the canker of seeing our kids through quality education by all means at all costs.