Proprietors of private schools cry foul

Tamale,Oct.14, GNA - Heads of some public Senior Secondary Schools within the Tamale Metropolis have been accused of illegal admission of students from private schools without transfers.

Mr Albert Atutiga, Northern Regional Chairman of the Ghana National Association of Private Schools (GNAPS) who made the accusation on behalf of the association at a meeting with heads of private second cycle institutions in Tamale on Friday, said "this practice is killing the private schools since some of these students are heavily indebted to their former schools".


He therefore, appealed to the Northern Regional Directorate of Education and the Ministry of Education and Sports to intervene and address the situation.


Mr Atutiga who is also the Proprietor of Tamale Girls International High School (TAGIS) said students who had left for public schools on transfer without the knowledge of the authorities, owed TAGIS about 121 million cedis.

He said in addition to the students owing the private schools, the transfers were promoting cheating and corruption in the schools, because heads of the public schools would "manufacture" continuous assessment for them, which would not give the true performance of such students. At the Adventist Secondary School in Tamale, some students who left the school unceremoniously left behind a debt of about 100 million cedis.


Pastor Joseph Asiedu Offei, Assistant Headmaster of the school said: "We are not saying students should not go on transfer but what we are saying is that they should properly declare themselves before leaving". Pastor Asiedu Offei, who is also the interim Tamale Metropolitan Chairman of GNAPS, said the trend was now alarming and called on the appropriate authorities "to do something to stop the practice". Other heads of private schools at the meeting expressed similar sentiments but did not have statistics on how much the students owed their schools.