Free SHS: More than two students share a mono desk

A government teacher from the Abuakwa North district has exposed what he describes as fundamental challenges with the implementation of the Free SHS policy that must be tackled urgently.

Speaking on Morning Starr with Francis Abban on Monday, May 31, the teacher whose identity was not disclosed for fear of retribution said more than two pupils in a class share a mono desk which does not auger well for the students.

According to him, a school with over 2500 students has less than 500 desks forcing some students to sit on the laps of their colleagues.

He added that the school management has reached out to the government but so far their efforts have proved futile.

“With regards to my school, we have about 2,500 students but we don’t have enough desks. The school management has tried their best. They say some desks will be coming but as to the time they’ll come in, we don’t know. Because the students are not seated comfortably, so it doesn’t give room for them to concentrate.

“Because we don’t have enough desks, some students sit on the laps of their colleagues. More than two people sit on a mono desk…the issue of lack of desks cuts across in the district but the situation in my school is different.”

The free SHS policy implemented by the Akufo-Addo led administration in 2017 has been blighted by several challenges including lack of desks, reduced contact hours and poor infrastructure to accommodate all the beneficiary students.

But President on Saturday said the introduction and implementation of the Free Senior High School (SHS) policy has ensured that hundreds of thousands of young Ghanaians who, previously, would have had their education truncated at the Junior High School level, now have the opportunity to further their education.

“The policy has reversed decades of exclusion, which denied, on the average, one hundred thousand young men and women, annually, entry to senior high school education because of the poverty of their parents,” the President made this known on Saturday, 29th May 2021, when the University of Cape Coast conferred an Honorary Doctor of Philosophy in Educational Leadership degree on him, at a ceremony at the campus of the University.