Is KNUST ready for the first batch of the double track graduates?

Dear KNUST, UG and UCC I will want to believe you have already put measures in place in terms of how you are going to accommodate your new students? The first batch of students who enjoyed the free Senior High School (SHS) education will be completing this year by May. A good number of students who graduated some years ago are also looking forward to gaining admissions to the university of their choice. A lot of Junior high school students entered senior high schools as a result of the free education system. This will mean that a lot of such a number will be graduating this year. This has got me into thinking. I have been having sleepless night about this. The question I put to myself is, “are our universities ready to admit students above the normal number they have been admitting?” Accommodation: Accommodations have always been one of the problems our universities face. Many students in our universities face accommodation issues. Those universities which seem to have accommodations have to go through the pain of packing four to five students in one cubicle. Other students as per the customs of some universities are forced to look elsewhere for accommodation after their first year in school. I will want to ask the University of Ghana whether they are ready to accommodate the huge number of students who will probably gain entrance into their university. UCC, are you ready and have you put in place plans as to how you are going to accommodate your “freshers”? Dear KNUST, I will want to believe you have already put measures in place in terms of how you are going to accommodate your new students? The growth in the number of SHS graduates this year will by all means bring about a growth in the number seeking admissions into the various universities.

In terms of lecture hall, are the various universities ready to accommodate such a great number of students who will be entering in the upcoming academic year? Have all the universities officials met around the table to strategize how these issues are going to be resolved?

I must say that following the great number of graduates from SHS this year, there is going to be much pressure on the facilities of the various universities as a good number of them will want to enter the university.

Has Ghana as a country prepared herself enough to face such pressures? I am writing this letter to the universities just to remind them in case nothing has been done to that effect. Well done anyway if only you have put in place workable measures to help the situations that will come.

I hope and believe that the ministry of education has taken into consideration some problems our universities will face should a greater number of students enter our universities. And I further hope the ministry has planned how to solve those problems should they arise.

Let us not wait until we are faced with such issues before we sit on TV stations dragging the issues when we know very well we have no solutions to our problems as we usually do. I hereby beseech all VCs and stakeholders of various universities to beware of what might come. This is my worry. Opinion though!

From the pen of Emmanuel Graham Nyameke.