Executive Director for Africa Education Watch, Kofi Asare has questioned why key education reforms in the 4th Republic started under NPP gov’ts.
“All key education reforms in the 4th Republic started under NPP gov’ts. Why?” he disclosed this in a post shared via his social media pages.
Providing context to his question, Kofi Asare provided a breakdown into the various key education reforms which were started by the New Patriotic Party (NPP) governments in the Fourth Republic.
His post read “ON EDUCATION REFORMS
There have been 3 major Education Reforms in the past 4 decades:
Rawlings’ 1987 Reforms
Nana Addo’s 2018 Reforms
This is a historical fact, not my opinion!
Today’s education system essentially hinges on the legal and institutional frameworks of these reforms:
The 2007 Reforms birthed TVET Reforms through the establishment of COTVET through the passage of the COTVET Law, which provided the legal and institutional and broad policy framework for today’s TVET system.
The passage of the Education Act of 2009 (Act 779), which was signed on 6th Jan 2009, constitutes the legal and institutional foundations of today’s pre-tertiary education system. This informed the 2020 Pre-Tertiary Education Law
Act 778 established NTC, NaCCA and NIB (Now NaSIA) as regulatory bodies, introduced teacher professionalism frameworks, etc., which forms the bedrock of standards regulation in teaching, learning and assessment.
The 2018 Reforms saw the following institutional, legal and policy reinforcements to position the system globally:
Standards Based Curriculum
Secondary Education Curriculum
Pre-Tertiary Assessment Reforms (eg. NST)
Harmonization of TVET management (establishment of TVET Service)
Complementary Education Reforms (Establishment of CEA)
ICT in education reforms
Various legal reforms, including the CEA Act, Pre-Tertiary Education Act, Education Regulatory Bodies Act etc. –
Etc…
It is worth emphasizing that, when the NDC inherited the 2009 reform, they fully implemented it, including operationalising the NTC, NaCCA and NIB (now NaSIA), and piloting the teacher licensure etc.
I consider the conversion of Polytechnics to Technical Universities as a tertiary level policy reform which was initiated with the Original Technical Universities Law in 2016, with 8 or so being converted that year.
Just like the Colleges of Education law (2012) introduced by the NDC to upgrade Teacher Training Colleges into colleges, the NPP continued to implement the NDC initiated policy reforms.
But these are NOT Education Reforms. These are policy reforms. Education Reforms are systemic programmes, not interventions. However, they include policies and laws.
I am not assessing the fidelity of implementation. I am only saying that, the 2 key education reforms since 1992 started under NPP governments; and of course, were always continued by the NDC.
It is also a trite systems management canon that, once a reform commences, it must travel its life span before bringing onboard another reform. This means, political parties must not neccessarily launch new reforms when they aren’t needed.
If you disagree, come with counter facts let’s discuss.
All insults will be referred to my 24/7 block factory.
