Teachers at the Bolgatanga Polytechnic in the Upper East Region are angry over what they say is government’s failure to add their polytechnic to the ones being converted into technical universities.
President Mahama has already inaugurated the Takoradi Polytechnic with a five others to follow in the first phase of the conversion.
Addressing a news conference in Bolgatanga, the chairperson of the Bolgatanga Branch of POTAG, Florence Manazor, said the institution should have been considered in the first phase arguing that the technical committee responsible for championing the requirement process did not do due diligence.
She also added that, some of the deficiencies that have resulted in leaving some polytechnics out of the conversion process were to be addressed by government and should not be used to disqualify any polytechnic.
“The evaluation report on the Bolgatanga Polytechnic indicates that it was better than other polytechnics including those to be converted in September 2016 in terms of caliber of staff, space for expansion and courses being offered.
“The major deficiency according to the evaluation report was that, the polytechnic did not have any affiliations with industry and other institutions, but as matter of fact, the Polytechnic has affiliations with some industries and other tertiary institutions. It was unfortunate that the technical committee did not notice this duration their visit,” she added.
Florence Manazor explained that the evaluation report said that the polytechnic “should have been running or capable of running at least four Bachelor of Technology programmes in Science and Technology areas but due to a moratorium placed on staff recruitment and introduction of new programmes by government, the polytechnic was not allowed to start the B. Teach programmes even though the polytechnic is capable of running them.”
“The report by the technical committee also stated that, the polytechnic does not have fully equipped laboratories and workshop but it is the responsibility of the government to provide this facility as the polytechnic does not have enough resources to do that” Manazor stated.
Mrs. Manazor further appealed to government to consider using the policy to bridge the educational gaps between the south and the north by making technical universities accessible to northerners through an en-bloc conversion of all polytechnics into technical universities.
Other polytechnics like the Cape Coast Polytechnic and two others who are not in the first phase, have similarly accused government of discrimination.
–
By: Frederick Awuni/citifmonline.com/Ghanaa