Political scientist, Prof Ransford Gyampo, has expressed support for the proposal on the cancellation of the Teacher licensure examination.
According to him, the proposal by flagbearer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), John Dramani Mahama, is the right call considering the current state of the examination process.
He revealed that the way to go is not to introduce another layer of exam. On the contrary, he emphasized the need for a review of the curriculum and Training College exams for the purposes of addressing their identified deficiencies.
“I respectfully disagree with my good friend Franklyn Cudjoe of IMANI and support the proposal to cancel the Teacher Licensure Exams. Clearly, the type of education that train Teachers is faulty and must be fixed. But this can be internally done…”
Prof Ransford Gyampo
Creating new structures to address existing problems
Justifying his stance, Prof Gyampo stated that governments are fond of “creating new structures to deal with old problems” that can be dealt with, by overhauled existing structures.
He explained that even when government has the opportunity to overhaul existing structures to make them work, it would want to easily develop “useless new solutions” that do not solve problems.
“That’s how come we are always looking for new foreign coaches for the Black Stars, even though we know that the problems are within, and that, a serious overhaul of existing structures with a view to ensuring that our real talents and not “bribed talents” get to play, would revolutionize football in Ghana.”
Prof Ransford Gyampo
Furthermore, Prof Gyampo highlighted that inability of governments to create new structures to handle existing problem explains how government has gone to create a highly incompetent ‘eye service’ office of Special Prosecutor, instead of overhauling the prosecutorial powers of the Attorney General to ensure that it is effective in prosecuting all, regardless of partisan coloration.
“Ghana’s 1992 Constitution is more voluminous than the US Constitution. It has provisions that deals virtually with all aspects of our lives. But we are always looking for new laws to solve problems. The whole nation is 75 percent ‘churchical’ and we have huge Cathedrals almost everywhere in the country. But we still want to build a National Cathedral to solve some ‘manufactured problems’.”
Prof Ransford Gyampo
The solution to the problems the country faces now, Prof Gyampo emphasized, are known. To this effect, he revealed that there is therefore no need for “very crude and sometimes corrupt reasons”, create new ‘useless solutions’ when government hasn’t interrogated and fully made use of the existing structures that have better potency to deal with these challenges.
Various stakeholders have expressed their sentiments on the proposal to cancel the teacher licensure exam.
Wading in, the Colleges of Education Teachers Association of Ghana (CETAG) has expressed support for the licensure exams for teacher trainees, asserting that it is a beneficial policy and should not be cancelled.
The Association’s President, Prince Obeng Himah, revealed that the policy provides specialized training for teachers, distinguishing it from other professions. He believes that cancelling the policy would have a detrimental impact on the entire educational sector.
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