A REJOINDER TO ?EDUCATION MINISTRY ROLLS OUT PLAN TO TRANSFORM POLYTECHNICS INTO UNIVERSITIES.?
By
Dr. Charles Addo,
A news report attributed to the Ministry of Education yesterday, December 27, 2014, stated that stakeholders in the education sector are set to meet on January 8, 2015 to discuss a draft bill on transforming polytechnics into technical universities. According to this report, the actual construction of the University of Environment and Sustainable Development in the Eastern region would also begin in 2015, with the aim of equalizing public university distribution in all 10 regions in Ghana. The report further noted that work on 10 new colleges of education will also start in 2015.
It appears there is no end in sight for this NDC government?s penchant for propaganda intended to pull the wool over the eyes of some unsuspecting and na?ve Ghanaians, and unfortunately we have a significant number of them in Ghana. At a time that unemployment across the country has risen to the forefront of national debates and even led to the creation of a Graduate Unemployment Association in Ghana by affected groups, this government, through the deputy minister of education, Mr. Okudzeto-Ablakwa, is making such fruitless proposal as though it will offer a panacea to the high unemployment rate. Fact check: is it not the same Mr. Okudzeto-Ablakwa who was reported on 30th December 2013 at the Great Hall of the Kumasi Polytechnic to have stated that graduates of polytechnic institutions across the country should consider creating their own jobs and stop depending on government for employment and survival? Is it not the same Mr. Okudzeto-Ablakwa who stirred up unease among tertiary students and critics, when particularly a few years ago as the spokesman for the late former President Atta Mills Administration, he stated that the government had created over 1.6 million jobs in less than two years into Mills? administration? (Awuah, 2013).
How will upgrading these same institutions into technical universities solve the unemployment problem in the country? It appears that people thrusted into leadership positions by this NDC government are clueless with regards to what they are doing. We don?t have to make the same mistake over and over with our educational system like we did with the GCE Ordinary and Advanced Level systems of education. There was nothing wrong with those systems to begin with, except that the educational authorities may have been blinded by revolutionary and post-revolutionary zeal for change, just for the sake of change. In fact, the A-Level stage served as a cusp zone, a filtration system or gateway that assured both student quality just prior to entering the tertiary level, as well as the latent function of slowing down the entry of young adults into the labor market to ease the pressure on unemployment. It assured student quality because the two-year A-Level preparation was, in fact, equivalent to first year university level work, and several American universities were granting one year advanced placement for holders of the A-Level certificates. As a result of this blunder, today too many of our students who graduate from SHS have been poorly educated, our students know little, and their command of essential skills is too slight (Sakyi, 2011.)
At least, we can take a cue from what other countries did with their polytechnic institutions and the lessons they learned. For example, UK turned their polytechnics into universities under its ?Further and Higher Education Act 1992? which, made changes in the funding and administration of further education and higher education within England and Wales with consequential effects on associated matters in Scotland which had previously been governed by the same legislation as England and Wales. The most visible result was to allow thirty-five polytechnics to become universities. After 22 years today, the UK has realized that it was a big mistake and they want to reverse it. According to one report (Cockcroft, 2009), ?Britain?s former polytechnics, which were elevated to the status of ?new universities? in 1992, will revert [were reverted] to their original role and [to] provide vocational degrees under Government reforms.?
When are we going to learn to separate Ghana?s educational true interests from selfish political expediency? It is like converting the School of Forestry in Sunyani to the University of Energy and Natural Resources because the old School of Forestry offered a good site to keep a political campaign promise of establishing a public university in the Brong Ahafo region by the Mills Administration. It seems we are just happy changing names of institutions for change and political propaganda sake, with least regard being given to the repercussions of such actions after they have made their money and left the scene.
This proposed educational reform to polytechnic institutions in Ghana, coming on the heels of UK?s backtracking experience in educational reform in its polytechnic institutions, can only point to one thing: The NDC government, in its zeal to be able to point to one action of constructive change to fulfill its defaulted campaign promises to the electorates, want to point to its ?creation? of 10 public universities, carved out of existing polytechnics, to serve as 2016 presidential and parliamentary political campaign mantra. In this regard, I earnestly call on all true-meaning Ghanaians to rise up against this destruction of our educational system again. Mr. Okudzeto-Ablakwa only hopes to use this move to court cheap electoral votes from Polytechnic students, that he elevated them to university status. But is it in Ghana?s interests, in light of UK?s disappointment in this direction, and that it may even exacerbate the unemployment problem?
REFERENCES
Awuah, J. (2013). ?No Jobs For You ? Ablakwa.? Retrieved on 28th December, 2014 from, http://www.modernghana.com/news/511008/1/no-jobs-for-you-8211-ablakwa.html
Cockcroft, L. (2009. ?New universities could revert to polytechnic format.? Retrieved on 28th December, 2014 from,
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/4781291/New-universities-could-revert-to-polytechnic-format.html
?Education Ministry Rolls Out Plan to Transform Polytechnic into Universities? (2014). Retrieved on 28th December 2014 from, http://www.myjoyonline.com/news/2014/December-27th/education-
ministry-rolls-out-plan-to-transform-polytechnics-into-universities.
Sakyi, K. A. (2011). ?Is Our Educational System in Ghana Globally Competitive?? Retrieved October 24, 2013 from,
www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/artikel.php?ID=228046&comment=7481111#com
Source: Dr. Charles Addo, Lecturer, Catholic University College of Ghana, Fiapre
