More universities in the pipeline - Minister

A number of organizations and individuals are seeking government approval to establish private universities and training colleges, Mr. Ekwow Spio-Garbrah, Minister of Education has stated.

He said government has given approval to five out of the about 80 applications received. These include View Bay University, Catholic University, and Methodist University and Presbyterian University. Mr. Spio-Garbrah was speaking during the last of a series of interviews on the National Educational Forum, slated for November 17 to 19 in Accra. He said "the approval, should satisfy to some extent the increasing number of qualified senior secondary school (SSS) graduates, who each year wish to enter the universities but could not do so due to the limited number of universities in the country".

The Minister said he was optimistic that in the next 10 years more private universities would be established to reduce the pressure on the government owned tertiary institutions. "To regulate these institutions and monitor their activities closely", Mr. Spio-Garbrah said, "The educational oversight committee of the Ministry will soon come out with guidelines". This, he maintained "would ensure that they meet the requisite international standards in the provision of quality education at both basic and tertiary levels and also ensure that the future of education of our children are not jeopardized".

Mr. Spio-Garbrah said, "the future is very bright and Ghana had an excellent educational record long before independence because she has always been ranked among the best in Africa as far as education is concerned". "The country has over 20,000 educational institutions, both public and private from the basic to the tertiary level, the problem is how to fund them". "To maintain that high quality of education, especially at the tertiary level, requires funding, that is why the Ministry is hoping the forthcoming forum will help find answers to".

The Minister hinted that the document on the proposed educational trust fund is ready and would be presented at the forum for discussion and later to Parliament and hopefully become operational by next year. He said more than six billion textbooks are currently being printed by Ghanaian publishers to be delivered to schools in the county.