The Education Minister, Dr. Yaw Osei Adutwum, has defended the multiple reforms the government is carrying out as being necessary to improve education in Ghana.
At a press conference on Sunday afternoon, the Minister cited infrastructure development, teacher training, targeted instruction, parent engagement, textbook reforms, training of headteachers as some of these reforms.
“If you see me doing eight things, don’t think I am doing one too many things, because if I don’t, the outcomes will not show.”
Some of these reforms, like the National Standardised Test, have been met with criticism from education stakeholders.
The reform Dr. Adutwum has championed the most has been Science, Technology Engineering, and Mathematics education.
Dr. Adutwum maintains that this particular reform is critical to his vision for education in Ghana.
“If I say I want to change the education system in this country and I leave out STEM, our education will not produce 21st-century outcomes.”
“If you know something about education, the sense of urgency, when it hits, takes you in a different direction, but you have to work with a team. Each will do their part. TVET will do its part. GES will do its part. Everybody will do their part.”
Dr. Adutwum also expects state agencies to realign themselves in line with the new reforms.
“All of them have to reinvent themselves for us to get the kind of education system the good people of Ghana expect from us. If we don’t, we perish.”