{"id":353146,"date":"2017-09-13T15:41:44","date_gmt":"2017-09-13T15:41:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=353146"},"modified":"2017-11-10T11:24:38","modified_gmt":"2017-11-10T11:24:38","slug":"free-shs-threatens-our-investments-jobs-private-school-heads","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/2017\/09\/free-shs-threatens-our-investments-jobs-private-school-heads\/","title":{"rendered":"Free SHS threatens our investments, jobs &#8211; Private school heads"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Conference of Heads of Private Second Cycle Schools (CHOPSS), is demanding the government expands the coverage of the free secondary education policy to include\u00a0private schools to save them from possible collapse.<\/p>\n<p>The conference has expressed its disappointment with the effect the policy is having on admissions in\u00a0private schools, with reports that enrollment of first-years has dropped significantly.<\/p>\n<p>[contextly_sidebar id=&#8221;dPMF9hvLR4iTGma3IPY9gqjPF4P66cKb&#8221;]Addressing the press\u00a0in Accra on Wednesday, the National Secretary of CHOPSS, Joseph Dzamesi, conveyed the fears members of the conference losing the investments they had made in the private secondary schools and the possible job losses.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;What is to happen to the millions of Ghana cedis that have been invested into our schools. What is to happen to 10,000 plus Ghanaian workers who are employed in our schools,&#8221; he questioned.<\/p>\n<p>A country like Rwanda, which introduced free education in 2003, has seen similar fears manifest with dwindling admissions leading to 30 private schools <span style=\"color: #666699;\"><strong><a style=\"color: #666699;\" href=\"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/2017\/08\/21\/improved-public-schools-in-rwanda-see-private-academies-close-down\/\">closing indefinitely<\/a><\/strong><\/span> in 2017, while others are struggling to stay afloat after losing students to public schools.<\/p>\n<p>The private schools in Rwanda that stayed open were struggling to meet their operational costs because of the sharp decline in enrollment.<\/p>\n<p>With these fears in mind, CHOPSS is asking what the government&#8217;s plan is &#8220;to provide a platform that gives our [private] schools a realistic chance to thrive.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong>Provide option for private schools<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Offering their suggestions, they asked the government to, as a matter of urgency,\u00a0include private SHSs among the schools listed on the self-placement website, which ordinarily has public senior high schools which are covered under the free SHS policy.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Our schools should be tagged private and the parents should be informed that when a private school is selected, the students would have to pay the school fees,\u201d Mr. Dzamesi stated.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;With this, a student\u00a0who may not be happy with his or her placement or a student who is not able to find a school that he or she likes may select a private school on the website and go to that private school.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Explaining how extending the free SHS policy to private schools would work, Mr. Dzamesi said the government could mimic the National Health Insurance system\u00a0and simply give students the money to cover their secondary education so they could choose between a private or public school.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We, therefore suggest that the amount of money earmarked per student to attend senior high school be granted to the student, whether he or she attends a public or private senior high school\u2026 if a parent needs to add GHc200 to it in order to afford the total fees in a private senior high school then that becomes the option of the parents.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Mr. Dzamesi underscored the NPP\u2019s belief in the private sector as the engine of growth for the economy, reminding the government that,\u00a0\u201cacross different sectors of the economy, government has partnered with the private sector in the delivery of quality services to Ghanaians.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;<\/p>\n<p>By: Zoe Abu Baidoo\/Delali Adogla-Bessa\/citifmonline.com\/Ghana<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Conference of Heads of Private Second Cycle Schools (CHOPSS), is demanding the government expands the coverage of the free secondary education policy to include\u00a0private schools to save them from possible collapse. The conference has expressed its disappointment with the effect the policy is having on admissions in\u00a0private schools, with reports that enrollment of first-years [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2,10,11],"tags":[273,253,3,906],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v20.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Free SHS threatens our investments, jobs - Private school heads - Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. 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