The Minister of Education, Dr. Yaw Osei Adutwum, has charged newly inaugurated governing councils to colleges of education in the country to explore innovative and creative ways to maintain if not improve the quality of trained teachers.
The training of teachers must improve to equip newly trained teachers with the use of technology and the ability to create smart learning spaces that will unearth the talents of students efficiently. This, he said, is very important in an era of the fourth industrial revolution (4IR) driven by technology and the Internet of Things.
“I challenged all Council Members to explore innovative and creative ways to maintain the quality of teacher training while training assertive and empowered trainees who will also empower our children in the classroom,” he said.
Government, through the Education Ministry, has been championing an agenda to increase tertiary enrolment to 40 percent from the current 19 percent, and concurrently shift the sciences to humanities ratio to at least 40:60 by 2030.
Dr. Adutwum further stated that if the country wants to get to the gross tertiary enrolment target, there is need to improve the capacity of the colleges of education in the country. As such he mentioned that consultations are underway to upgrade some colleges of education to stand-alone universities.
“The GTEC is in the process of evaluating the various colleges of education so that we can get Parliament to approve a project that will enable some of them to become independent universities either individually or in collaboration with a cluster of colleges,” he said.
This, the minister highlighted that when implemented, would expand the scope of the institutions and help to solve the high attrition rate of teachers; adding that many colleges around the world had widened their scope to include engineering and economics to enable students to contribute more to the growth of their respective communities.
The Education Minister made these remarks at the inaugural ceremony of governing councils of 10 colleges of education at the ministry.
They are Tamale, Kibi, OLA, Fosu, Holy Child, and Peki Colleges of Education. The rest are St. Louis, St. John Bosco, St. Monica’s, and Gambaga Colleges of Education.
