Interact with each other in addressing difficult concerns, Teachers urged

Teachers have been asked to seek assistance from colleagues on subject areas they find challenging to avoid feeding their pupils with half-baked knowledge.

Mrs Philomena Afeti, South-Tongu District Director of the Ghana Education Service (GES), made the call during sixth and final 2012 South-Tongu Conference of Heads of Basic Schools (COHBS) at Sogakope.

She said some teachers would dodge subjects and topics the considered difficult leaving their pupils stranded and appealed to teachers to show real commitment to the profession they had chosen for themselves.

The conference, which was also attended by some Circuit Supervisors, discussed the welfare of teachers as well as improving standards of education in the area.

Mrs Afeti said the situation where teachers now demanded financial returns for any extra duty as worrying, recalling that “in the past we offered extra classes and duties for free with gladness, our greatest motivation then was seeing our pupils perform,” she said.

She said teachers were in a better financial bracket that many others and asked public sector teachers to put their pay against their performance and compare it with counterparts in the private sector, using the same benchmark.

Mrs Afeti entreated head-teachers stop passing on their supervisory duties to Circuit Supervisors, who obviously, could not be in every school at the same time.

She also asked teachers qualified to be examiners to apply to the examination bodies for recruitment as that experience could help them a lot in their teaching.

Mrs Vincentia Darke, Volta Regional COHBS, Chairperson said head teacher’s responsibility allowances were now being paid because of the influence of the Association.

Mr Martin Afianu Gatsola, District COHBS Chairman, appealed to defaulting schools heads to pay their dues to the Association.