Poverty Not A Barrier To Education, pupils study on their bellies in Nalerigu

The President of the Republic of Ghana has indicated that the Government has ensured that poverty is no longer a stumbling block to the access of education as far as Ghanaian children are concerned.

However,  primary school pupils in the Nalerigu English and Arabic Basic Primary School have been forced to lie on their bellies or sit on the floor during lessons. Eight years after a storm destroyed the school building, the school now faces an imminent collapse, JoyNews’ North East regional correspondent, Illiasu Tanko reports.

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The roof of a three-unit classroom block of the school was ripped off in 2014 and has since not been fixed, forcing authorities to mix the displaced school pupils from KG to upper primary in an old structure.

More disturbing, there are no desks in the school, a situation which perpetuates truancy among pupils who are not enthused about taking lessons while sitting or lying on the floor. Tanko reports that the pupils present at the time of his visit also threatened to play truancy and drop out if their situation is not bettered.

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This is a clear sign of poverty and neglect by the government to provide essentials for educating Ghana’s future workforce. We seem to be interested in the numbers forgetting that quality is key.

One can be sure that no politician has a child in that school.  According to a publication sighted by NewsGhana24 on The Parrot Communications Team, a key mouth peace for the ruling NPP government and its party, the implementation of the Free SHS policy in September 2017 has dealt with poverty as an excuse for school children and parents.

But there are many children in school suffering, teachers do not have textbooks to work with. According to President Akufo-Addo, “I am glad that we are now able to say that education in the public sector is free from Kindergarten to Senior High School, which we have redefined as basic education.

This initiative has resulted in a significant increase in pupil enrollment, with 1.2 million children currently in Senior High School, the highest in our nation’s history.”

So we ask…is Poverty really no longer a barrier to education in Ghana?

Sources: JoyNews | NewsGhana24