05-10-2011
Narration: A study conducted in the Builsa District of the Upper East Region has proven that the need for Community Teaching Assistants (CETAs) seems to be established based on the general growing demand for jobs by the youth and the Ghana Education Service to fill in the gap created in deprived communities of the district where teacher vacancies exist. Even though the CETA model under the National Youth Employment Programme remains a viable alternative to filling the teacher shortage in the district, the capacity of beneficiaries remain less developed which is dangerous for quality education and could affect students they teach. This was made known at the opening of a two day capacity building workshop organized by the Northern Network for Education Development (NNED) at Sandema. The Project Facilitator of NNED, Frederick Adimazoya, who made the revelation, said the purpose of the workshop forms part of his outfit’s advocacy efforts geared at ensuring quality education for all in northern Ghana through its community driven advocacy strategies. Isaac Asare was there for Radio Ghana.
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The event dubbed: “Time with CETAs” was to serve as a platform for CETA beneficiaries to engage stakeholders and actors to effectively discuss and share their challenges towards achieving quality education. It was therefore an opportunity for CETA beneficiaries to add their voices to the dialogue process on how to build their capacities. The engagement forum attracted key stakeholders in the educational sector of the district including the District Chief Executive, the District Coordinating Director, the National Youth Employment Coordinator and the District Director of Education among others. According to Mr. Adimazoya, NNED as a network of civil society organizations has undertaken several studies to assess the impact of CETA on quality education and has come to the realization that CETA is faced with numerous challenges, thereby contributing to their inability to teach effectively in class. One of the major challenges he identified is lack of requisite skills and training to build their capacity. The engagement forum he however indicated could not have come at any better time, than now that there is increasing realization that educational standards are fallen from bad to worse partly due to teacher absenteeism, inadequate teacher motivation and scarcity of professional teaching staff in schools. On the issue of lack of requisite training, Mr. Adimazoya complained that beneficiaries of CETA as compared to their counterparts in the health sector are sometimes denied the opportunity to be trained as teachers as some of them receive less than a week training before posted to begin actual teaching in class. The practice, he identified has rippling effect on the quality of teaching and learning in schools particularly, in public primary schools in northern Ghana. He therefore called on the government and authorities concern to explore ways of ensuring the proper training of teachers serving in deprived communities of the country. The District Director of Education, Mr. Gregory Amoah in reaction to some of the concerns raised, encouraged CETA beneficiaries to help themselves with the little resources they have to upgrade themselves and also put up their best in adapting to modern and practical ways of teaching in order to meet the challenges ahead. He said his outfit is looking forward to engage some community teaching assistants who by dint of hardwork are recommended by their various heads of institutions as a form of exit point and a measure of motivation. The District Chief Executive, Norbert Awulley said the assembly is ready to assist any member of CETA that wishes to upgrade his educational career provided the person poses the right qualification and follows the due process as required by the assembly. He hinted that the assembly in collaboration with the GES is putting in place interventional measures to improve academic standards in the district and charged teachers to remain committed to their jobs and refrain from unruly behaviours. He said acts of indiscipline could no longer be tolerated in schools and that circuit supervisors should play their supervisory roles effectively to expose culprits. Awulley waged his anger on drunken teachers and cautioned them to desist from the act since those caught would be face appropriate sanctioned. On the issue of in -service training, Mr. Awulley charged the GES to direct all head teachers to occasionally hold training workshop for unqualified teachers to enhance their knowledge in the profession.
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