Features
Bringing education back to former glories
Education plays a pivotal role in the development of any country in all aspects, be it social, economic, political, cultural or moral advancement. It is one of the foremost rights to be given priority and provided for all humans. It is, therefore, a right not a privilege and every human is entitled to it.
Simply put, education, is, therefore, regarded as a platform to manipulate the needed manpower for national development. The sole purpose, is to train an individual to meet the needs of society and to boost national development in the best possible ways. It presupposes that, the quality of a nation’s education, determines the level of its national development.
IMPORTANCE OF EDUCATION
An educational environment, helps people to figure out the skills that they badly need to get rid of poverty, unemployment, illiteracy and other social and economic problems. Therefore, schools at various levels, are encouraged to educate upcoming future leaders and develop the multi-dimensional and technical capabilities needed for economic growth and development.
Without a proper and quality education for the citizens, all the various sectors of an economy of any country will suffer immensely, because it is the available manpower that propels all the economic sectors. That is why it is important for any country to provide the youth who are the future leaders with a well-tailored and proper education to help in the national reconstruction.
GHANA’S EDUCATION NOT CREATIVE
Unfortunately, in Ghana, we are being told by the number three gentleman of the land, Rt-Hon Alban Kingsford Sumani Bagbin, the Speaker of our august Parliament that, the country’s educational system is not what it used to be in the past, as it teaches students to memorise, rather than making them creative.
Speaker Bagbin expressed this concern and noted that, the system should be organised in a manner that would encourage creativity among the students. “Our educational system is not too good. We mostly develop one aspect of our brains which is the memory and so, what they teach you is what you chew, assimilate and accommodate. Therefore, when they ask you a question, you try to reproduce what you have chewed. Our educational system does not teach many to be creative to come up with our own ideas”, he said.
He professed that, both youth development and empowerment, were very essential and, must go hand-in-hand.
His assertion has attracted a lot of comments from Ghanaians majority of whom agreed with his observation, calling on government, parliament and the educational authorities to take a second look at the deplorable educational system and make it functional and workable.
‘CHEW, POUR, PASS AND FORGET’ MENTALITY
It is a fact that, for many years, our educational system, seemed to place much premium on memorisation by repetition and that had become an impediment for people to be forward-looking. This mentality is based on what can be termed, “chew, pour, pass and forget” system and this cuts across all the educational ladder. This can be very dangerous for our survival as a nation.
This type of training, especially, in the country’s universities, makes it difficult for graduates to apply what they have learnt in schools to the world of work. From the perspectives of most students, assessment methods used in their universities, had failed to examine their ability to answer practical questions even in their fields of study. This means that, lecturers in the various universities are not doing the right thing, and that they must try as much as possible to make their assessment more practical and applied to the real world of work.
SKILLED MANPOWER EDUCATION
This country needs skilled people to propel its economic aspirations and a school system that can help foster that agenda of technical and vocational education. The current educational system in this country, measures people purely on cognitive ability, which is not all that we need. It is, indeed, sad that to-date, we are engaged in this ‘chew, pour, pass and forget’ system of learning and that, students have not been empowered to self-develop and learn the skills for themselves, instead, they are prepared to study and pass examinations and that seems destructive.
GES ASSURANCE OF NEW CURRICULUM
The Ghana Education Service (GES) in 2019, gave a firm assurance that it would roll out a new educational curriculum that would focus on the total development of the child and not to be an examination-focused, to discourage the ‘chew, pour, pass and forget’ syndrome.
Dr Prince Armah, the Executive Secretary of the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NaCCA), disclosed this when he granted an interview to the media in 2019. According to him, the new curriculum, when introduced, would develop people who would be able to fit into the development priorities of the country.
Two years on, there is nothing to prove that the proposed new curriculum has been introduced to streamline the process because the old mentality of ‘chew, pour, pass and forget’ continues unabated in all spheres of the educational ladder.
LACK OF ADEQUATE ATTENTION TO EDUCATION
It is instructive to say that the fallen standards of education in this country, clearly reveals that we are not giving adequate attention to the management of education and that, there is something basically wrong which we need to address in order to lift up the fallen standard. The pidgin English has even compounded the current situation. Students in our universities no longer speak the queen’s language which is English language fluently. They have adulterated the language with pidgin and that is not helpful.
Now that the Speaker of Parliament has raised his voice over this worrying situation, it means the problem has assumed a larger dimension which calls for all hands on deck approach to deal with the fallen standard of education in the country.
NATIONAL DIALOGUE ON EDUCATION
There is the need for a national educational dialogue which will assemble all the stakeholders in educational sector to brainstorm on how best this country can address the fallen standards of education across board to bring it in line with international standard to make it more potent and relevant to the needs of the society.
There should also be regular and constant training programmes for our teachers to prepare them adequately with modern trends in the profession to address the challenges in the educational sector.
The Minister of Education should be invited to appear before Parliament to give an overview of the current situation on the educational front and how he intends to address the problem to enable the country to regain its former glories in that sector.
The time is now for an all deck approach to tackle and deal decisively with the fallen trend of education in our beloved country.
By Charles Neequaye
Conflict at work is more common than you might think. According to 2022 research by The Myers-Briggs Company, more than a third of the workforce reports dealing with conflict often, very often, or all the time in the workplace.
Addressing a dispute might feel tense or awkward, but resolving the conflict is typically well worth it in the long run. Whether you are trying to mediate conflict between colleagues or are directly involved. Last week we looked at three and this week is the remaining four steps you can take to manage workplace conflict.
4. Find common ground
The best way to handle workplace conflict is to start with what you can agree on. Find common ground between the people engaging in conflict. If you are directly involved in the conflict, slow down and focus on results instead of who’s right.
If you are the mediator for conflict resolution between coworkers, observe the discussion and help point out the common ground others may not see.
5. Collectively brainstorm solutions
When deciding how to handle workplace conflict, it can be tempting to problem-solve on your own. Sometimes, it feels easier to work independently rather than collaboratively. However, if you want to achieve a lasting resolution, you will need to motivate your team to get involved.
Brainstorm possible solutions together, and solicit input from everyone involved on the pros and cons of each option until you settle on a solution that feels comfortable to everyone. This will help all team members feel a sense of ownership that can help prevent future conflicts.
6. Create an action plan
Once you have created an open dialogue around workplace conflicts, it is time to resolve them. Just like any other work goal, this requires creating a concrete plan and following through.
Create an action plan and then act on it. It does not matter what the plan is, as long as you commit to it and resolve the conflict as a result.
7. Reflect on what you learned
All conflicts offer an opportunity to grow and become a better communicator. Identify what went well and what did not.
Work with your whole team to gather learnings from the conflict so you can avoid similar situations in the future.
Today, I continue with my narration of personalities and their accomplishments as members of the Ghanaian Diaspora in Finland, with a focus on Mr Joseph Osei Amoah.
Mr Amoah is one of the senior members of the Ghanaian community in Finland and a top member of the Ghana Union Finland, an association of the Ghanaian migrant community in Finland.
He is an active and a well-respected person in the Ghanaian community in Finland. Mr Osei Amoah moved to Finland in the mid-1990s, and he has lived in Helsinki all this time.
Accomplishments and honours
It is important to recount accomplishments as part of the success stories of the personalities of Ghanaian descent in Finland in order to highlight their exploits both within the Ghanaian migrant community and in the wider Finnish society.
Mr Amoah holds a Master’s degree in Demography from the University of Helsinki. At the time he came to Finland in 1994, he had majored in Economics at the Bachelor’s level at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST).
Sometimes affectionately called “Chairman” in the Ghanaian migrant community, Mr Osei is a former Chairman of the New Patriotic Party’s (NPP) branch in Finland, assuming office around 2015, a few months after the branch was formed, until 2019 when he did not run again for the elections. He helped to bring vibrancy into the NPP Finland branch.
Religious life
Mr Amoah is a prominent member of the Global Methodist Church in Finland. In spite of his busy working life and other responsibilities, he remains a committed member of the Global Methodist Church in Finland.
He plays a key leadership role in the church, which is attended by many Ghanaian migrants and other African migrants, Finns, and those of other nationalities.
His position in Asanteman Finland
Mr Osei Amoah is an outstanding member of the Asanteman Finland, where he is the Gyasehene, a prominent position as a sub-chief in the Asante (and Akan) royal hierarchy, in the functioning of the traditional authority systemgenerally in Ghana.
The Asanteman Finland is an association formed purposely with the aim of supporting each other as well as to ensure unity among its members and others outside of the group.
One of its top priorities of Asanteman Finland is to display the Asante culture in Finland. Mr Osei Amoah finds this as very important since by upholding the traditional culture and heritage, the association enables its members and especially the young ones to get the chance to learn and appreciate Asante and Ghanaian cultural values. They do this through rites such as marriage, the naming ceremony, and death and funeral rites, which makes the people to learn more of their provenance and not forget their origins.
“My point is that, by displaying the traditional heritage it helps people to learn more about their provenance. For, I think it will be embarrassing to go home and see that even the young ones have much knowledge about how to perform certain rites whilst those of us in the diaspora may be deficient in understanding those practices”, he argued. It is also very important for the young ones who are born in Finland to learn what the culture of their original society is, he continued.
The Finnish educational system
Mr Osei has a lot to say about the Finnish educational system, which he sees as very good. “When we came to Finland, education was free. There were library books and manuscripts readily available in the library, and one could print or make as many photocopies as possible for your studies. There was more flexibility. One could read books and write exams on them for the necessary grades in order to complete your studies”. In his opinion, Ghana could learn much from the Finnish system, which is one of the best in the world.
He said the only initial challenge he found in Finland was how to master the Finnish language, without which it was difficult to get a job befitting one’s status after the studies. But things have changed today and there are many English courses so it is easy to study and get a job that matches your studies, especially in the area of ICT, he said.
His role in the Ghanaian community
Mr Osei Amoah has been very active in the Ghanaian community, as I have indicated earlier. He is still very active in the Ghana Union Finland, and has played a leadership in many functions organised by the Union, as a non-governmental organisation for the Ghanaian migrant community in Finland.
Mr Amoah has been a counsellor and mentor who has guided many young Ghanaian migrants on their career paths and has also been part in settling various kinds of conflicts between opposing parties or persons. In conclusion, I would say Mr Osei Amoah has succeeded in embossing his name in the golden pages of visionary Ghanaians in both Sweden and Finland.
With Dr Perpetual Crentsil
