Asankragwa Nursing College CHARGING UNAPPROVED FEES

The Nursing college at Asankragwa is reported to have started charging unapproved fees something the students who just returned to school after the lockdown have kicked against. The school is in the Wassa Amenfi West Municipality of the Western region.

This is not n uncommon practice in nursing training colleges in the country. It has been the usual way of making “illegal money” from students when it’s time for them to write their final exam must stop and it begins with Nursing college at Asankragwa.

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The students have been asked by school authorities to cough Ghs1000.00 per head as money to be paid to external supervisors. This is illegal and must not be allowed anywhere. This will be used by the school to probably “bribe” supervisors or to be pocketed by a few greedy leaders.

In addition to the above, our checks revealed that, prior to the lockdown, students had already paid in full their fees for the semester. The school has, however, also released a notice that students are to pay an NMC’s licensing registration fees of 495.00 cedis and an additional GHS461.00 cedis for what it called Fees for licensing revision. Thus students are to pay a total of GHS 956.00 cedis.

Why should students pay their lecturers or tutors for revision lessons which are supposed to be part of their duty towards helping students prepare well toward their final exams?

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Failure on students’ part to pay the fees would warrant the student not to be registered for the licensing exam, the directive added.

With lost income over the past three months, many of these students will not be a position to pay these fees because a lot of parents can’t afford this amount in this abnormal times we find ourselves.

And the fact that a huge part of the close to GHS2000 is illegal makes it even worse. The question is where in the world do students pay supervisors to perform a duty they are legally required to perform for which they are paid on a monthly basis?

According to the school authorities, it is the sole duty of final year students preparing for the final exams to take care (paying of their accommodation and other costs) of the supervisors coming.

This is not only just an illegal fee but an illegal act as well by the leadership of the Nursing College at Asankragwa. We call on the Nursing and Midwifery Council of Ghana to take the necessary action to ensure only approved fees are charged students and to investigate this alleged charging of unapproved fees including an attempt to milk students and parents because they are in their final year.

The Ministry of Health must take the need action to ensure, efforts of government in this election year is not messed by self-seeking officers at Asankragwa nursing college. The management of the school must be made to explain the reason behind their decision.