Dangers of not releasing the 2022 Academic Calendar for Pre-Tertiary Schools on time

Wisdom K.E Hammond 3 years ago

Dangers of not releasing 2022 Academic Calendar for Schools on time

The Double-Track SHS 2022 Semester 1 calendar for Free SHS is not out just as the full 2022 Academic Calendar for Pre-Tertiary Schools.

The Ghana Education Service has since 2019 hijacked the proactive release of the school calendar for basic schools making it impossible for teachers, parents, and students to know when school will reopen each time school vacates.

As we publish this write-up, the 2022 Academic Calendar for Pre-Tertiary Schools is not out. In the past, stakeholders knew the full year calendar even before schools vacated at the Basic and Secondary school levels.

It is sad to say that, today, the Academic Calendar for Pre-Tertiary Schools has become a difficult-to-find commodity.

School children are on vacation but they do not know when they are reopening. When you asked them when are they going back to school, They tell you that they have been directed to listen to the radio for that information.

This continuous holding back of this important information from teachers, parents, and students can be summed up to mean poor leadership, lack of proactive thinking, and planning. The late announcement of reopening dates has a negative impact on parents and their attempt to plan their finances and other stuff towards their ward’s education.

Teachers and students of the Free SHS are the worse hit because each track has at least 2 calendars for the same year group and it takes some time for them to sink in.

There are softwares for planning school calendars and excel can be an easy-to-use tool for modeling the 2022 Academic Calendar for Pre-Tertiary Schools.

We want to believe that the officers in charge of creating and planning the academic calendar have already worked on it. Lessons from the 2021 calendar should guide in ensuring there are no errors, unnecessary changes, and eleventh-hour announcements that cause parents, teachers, and students a lot of discomforts.

The academic calendar helps to maintain open communication with the public and helps families, educators, and students to stay on the same page with managers of school activities in Ghana.

READ: 2022 Basic School Academic Year: Trimester & Semester Calendars

It helps to avoid anxieties among stakeholders. This can be achieved if the calendar is released early enough to help in planning and decision-making at all levels. The kind of surprise them calendar releasing strategies of the current managers of education in Ghana is not only annoying but very disheartening and very frustrating.

The Calendar gives teachers the needed information to plan their lessons and scheme of learning to match the number of weeks per term. It helps teachers who need to travel long distances to their schools and stay on or off-campus to plan their journey and lives for the semester or term. It is vital for long-range planning for teachers.

READ: 1-year national service for S.H.S leavers is good but not appropriate replacement for COVID-19 disruption- Counsellor Daniel Fenyi

The importance of having an accurate school calendar that is made available ahead of time before the start of the school term or semester or year.

The delay in releasing the school calendar by the GES is a testament that the administration of education is poor and we are getting the basics wrong at the national level.