On Tuesday February 28, Eduwatch paid a working visit to the Yilo Krobo Municipal Assembly where the team interacted with officials at the Education Directorate, the Department of Social Welfare and the Municipal Assembly to discuss the piloting of a framework for supporting the re-entry of teenage mothers and survivors of child marriage to school in the Municipal.

Eduwatch, as part of SERVE III Project is providing technical support to the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection, to develop and implement a material support framework to facilitate the re-entry of teen mothers and pregnant school girls. The Yilo Krobo Municipal has been selected as the piloting district upon the completion of the framework.

The Gender Desk Officer, Rachel Owusu, and the Municipal Coordinating Director, Eric Hini expressed their delight and appreciation for the initiative and committed to supporting Eduwatch to achieve the project's objective.

The district entry engagement is an activity under phase 3 of the Securing Educational Rights of Vulnerable students in the COVID Era (SERVE III), being implemented by Eduwatch with support from FCDO, and in partnership with STAR-Ghana Foundation.

© Africa Education Watch

On Wednesday March 1, Eduwatch held a virtual public forum with education stakeholders to discuss issues surrounding the 2023 Senior High School (SHS) placements, particularly the successes and challenges of the Computerised School Selection and Placement System (CSSPS).

Participants including a former Director General of the Ghana Education Service (GES), the National Executive Director of the Ghana National Council of Private Schools, the National Coordinator of Ghana National Education Campaign Coalition, teachers, parents, and civil society partners, shared their experiences with the school selection and placement processes, and made recommendations to improve the efficiency of the CSSPS.

Eduwatch will on Tuesday March 7, submit a Memorandum on the issues discussed for engagement with the Minister of Education.

© Africa Education Watch

The Ministry of Education has been fined an amount of GHS50,000 by the Right to Information (RTI) Commission over the reluctance of the Minister to release details of the 2021/2022 Computerized School Placement.

The African Education Watch had exhausted all administrative procedures required for accessing the information, but the Minister refused to honour the request and also failed to respond to the RTI Commission’s letter on the matter.

Nearly everything about the 2021/2022 School placement has been clouded in secrecy, and the public is wondering what the Minister and the Ministry of Education are hiding from the General public. One key maxim of equity is “He who comes to equity must come with clean hands”

The investigative piece by the Fourth Estate which was released on the same 2021/2022 school placement revealed that employees of the Ministry and some syndicates were selling school placements into Free SHS. The rot was further traced to the office of the Minister of Education, who is yet to openly react to the news making rounds.

The big question is what is the Minister and the Ministry of Education hiding from the public, for which reason it refused to make the data requested by African Education Watch available?

For failing to respond to the Applicant and the RTI Commission, the RTI took a final decision on the matter and for this reason, an administrative penalty of Ghs50,000 was imposed on the respondent and this shall be payable to the commission not later than 14 days after the receipt of this decision of the commission. The penalties imposed shall attract an additional potential default penalty rate of 10% on the principle that the sum of Ghs50,000 and in the event of default for any additional 14 days thereafter. This is according to the letter from the RTI Commission sighted by ExamHall. Org.

The RTI also directed that the following pieces of information pertaining to the school placement for the 2021/ 2022 academic year be released to the applicant

a. The index numbers of all candidates placed
b. Schools of all candidates list
c. JHS attended by all candidates placed
d. The Raw score of all candidates placed

There is no doubt that the release of the data or piece of information requested by the Africa Education Watch will get heads rolling after the applicant has done a thorough data analysis.

The information requested, if finally released, will also the public to know for instance
1. Candidates who never deserved category A or B schools based on their grades were placed there.
2. It will help make public the rot that went on and those who paid their way through to get their wards placed in schools that their children ordinarily, by the rules of the school placement, do not deserve.
3. It will also help reveal if students from private JHS were fairly treated during the 2021/2022 school placement.

The Examhall.org believes there are interesting days ahead and look forward to sharing the findings of the African Education Watch from the data they would receive from the Minister of Education and the Ministry as directed by the RTI Commission.

Source: examhall.org