Professor Kwasi Opoku-Amankwa, Director-General of the Ghana Education Service
• The Ghana Education Service has justified the GHS34.8M expenditure on ‘pasco’ for WASSCE candidates
• According to the Director-General of the GES, the purchase was to ensure a 100% pass by students under Free SHS
• Government has been accused of scoring political points after critics said the Free SHS policy is not sustainable
The Ghana Education Service has said the last thing on its mission is for final year Senior High School students to go to the exams hall and fail.
Thus, the procurement of the controversial past questions amounting to GH¢34. 8m, the educational institution said, was a necessary.
Government after procuring 460,000 past questions for final year SHS students who sat for the last examinations, came under heavy criticism.
While there was heavy criticism against the Akufo-Addo government with the allegation it was seeking to score political points with the first batch of Free Senior High School graduates, many have not relented it speaking up about the challenges plagued with the educational policy programme.
But the Director-General of the Ghana Education Service, Professor Kwasi Opoku-Amankwa, briefing the press on Thursday, August 27, said the move was to ensure that students excelled in the exams.
“We can’t say that preparing students to perform well in examinations is bad. All over the world, there are three things that are done in schools. They are curriculum, instructions, and assessments. When we are drawing the programs, we usually begin by assessing them, which helps us to design the kind of curriculum that we want. We go to school not to fail, so let’s get it right. At all costs, it is the responsibility of GES to ensure that people pass and pass well. Our ultimate is to have 100%.”
Prof Opoku-Amankwa, who hinted that such procurement will be considered in subsequent examinations, further justified that the earlier purchase by his outfit “was not a misplaced priority.”
“It is not a misplaced priority. If we were not doing this in the past due to limited resources, it does not mean going forward we shouldn’t. If we decide to make the school system churn out misfits, it will come back to haunt us.” He noted as reported by Citi News.