Remember when Dr Antonio Guiffrida (the World Bank Program Leader for Human Development), while presenting a report on the Human Capital Index in November 2018 indicated that “about 56% of Ghana’s human capital will go waste due to the poor quality of the country’s education”? As devastated as we all were, have we taken any strategic measures to curb the situation, if not change it altogether?

The World Economic Forum’s “The Future of Jobs Report 2018”, also indicates that manual dexterity, memory, reading, writing and math are all declining and on the rise are reasoning and problem-solving, creativity and initiative, analytical and critical thinking, emotional intelligence, ideation and innovation, among others.

These global competencies are to prepare young people for life after school and the global market, making them relevant and globally competitive

According to the report, the declining skills are repetitive in nature and will be replaced by robots as we are in the robotic revolution. On the other hand, tasks which cannot be done by robots are on the rise.

The good news is, some schools have already adjusted and are taking their students through some of these global competencies during the long vacation.

The Ministry of Education plans to incorporate these competencies in the national school curriculum in the new school year. To ensure a successful incorporation, there’s a need to develop the left and right side of the brain of the individual.

Unfortunately, there’s still more emphasis on the development of these declining skills than the rising skills in academic work, leading to more Ghanaian youth skewed towards the use of the left brain.

The typical life of a Ghanaian student in pre-tertiary is characterised by going to school for three (3) terms and then going again during the vacation for what schools term as “vacation classes”, where all they study are academics.

Academic work mainly develops the left side of the brain, as a result, utilises three (3) of the nine (9) intelligence types needed to make young people relevant when they become adults.

According to research conducted by Professor Alejandro Lleras, a professor of Psychology at the University of Illinois, one’s performance progressively declines when made to study continuously without taking a break. You see, back in the day when our parents used to send us to our grandparents in the village for vacation, things were really different.

For example, Mr Yeboah, a resident of Tema with a disturbed look on his face spoke about how he learnt gardening, values, history and customs and traditions from his grandparents in Dwaboso during his basic school vacations.

His concern was how his children do not know how to do some basic things he learnt from his grandparents. You imagine a 13-year old who can neither lay her bed nor iron and fold clothes without crumpling them. That is the current state of the majority of young people in the country.

LeadAfrique International, one of the leading names in Ghana when it comes to building leadership and soft skills in young people, has been running its annual residential camp dubbed Leadership Farm Summer Camp since 2015 for students.

Over the years, this camp has proven to support participants to unearth the greatness that resides in them and to equip them with ‘street smartness’.

Leadership Farm Summer Camp is a 7-day self-discovery camp for primary, junior high, senior high, and university-bound young people between ages 5 and19. We believe at the heart of every successful person is SELF-RELIANCE; thus, the theme for the 5th camp in 2019.

The goal for this year is to ensure that campers develop a positive habit of believing in their ability to solve their own problems, avoiding the temptation of rejecting their own opinions at the expense of allowing other people’s opinions to rule them. It has thus far empowered over 700 young people directly in the camps.