The Ghana Tertiary Education Commission (GTEC) has issued a directive mandating public universities to vacate senior high school (SHS) campuses. The move comes in response to concerns about the strain on infrastructure within SHS facilities, which are already overwhelmed by capacity challenges.
The directive aims to provide GTEC with the chance to conduct a thorough audit of all centres. This audit will assess various aspects, including the quality of teaching, the competence of teaching staff and the eligibility of students for admission.
In the past decade, many public universities have sought to broaden their reach by expanding distance learning programmes. As part of this expansion, they have established satellite operation centres at senior high school (SHS) campuses across the country without obtaining approval from GTEC.
Furthermore, all self-owned satellite campuses of the universities would have to be given campus accreditation before running academic programmes.
Director-General of GTEC, Prof. Ahmed Abdulai Jinapor, highlighted that beyond the pressure on infrastructure at the second cycle level, the proliferation of satellite campuses of most universities with charters was negatively affecting the growth and development of technical universities.
“Several traditional universities are operating satellite campuses in SHS campuses and on unapproved premises, thereby lowering the standard of education. It is of no surprise that in a school like Bolgatanga Senior High School, there can be about five different traditional universities running distance education programmes for students,” he said.
Speaking at the 12th congregation of the Bolgatanga Technical University (BTU) last weekend, the director-general lamented that the springing up of satellite campuses has impeded the progress of technical universities in other regions.
Providing some contest to the media on the sideline of the event, Prof. Jinapor explained that GTEC has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Vice-Chancellors of the affected universities toward the cessation of the practice, giving a year period to phase out.
“We have asked all these institutions to cease operations of satellite campuses in such environments moving forward. Indeed, I am happy to announce that GTEC has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with about six institutions to halt the admission of students into about 210 satellite campuses going forward,” he said.
The move is considered a laudable one considering the heightened pressure on facilities in SHSs following the implementation of the Free SHS policy, leading to double-track systems.
Aside from improving the quality of teaching and learning, the move would allow the technical universities to also attract more students that mostly would have been admitted to pursue programmes at the satellite campuses, thereby increasing their student population.
The Director-General of GTEC stressed that his outfit was committed to ensuring that technical education, which was the engine for the socio-economic development of the country, was realised.
“All technical universities need to be protected and that is what GTEC is working toward,” he emphasised.
