Education

Address teachers outstanding issues—WR GNAT

The Western Regional Secretary of the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT), Mr Nicholas Taylor, has urged the government to address some of the   outstanding issues affecting teachers for industrial harmony.

He said that majority of successful teachers in last year’s promotion interview had not been put on ‘scale’ while more than 500 teachers in the Western Region still have  unpaid salary arrears.

Mr Taylor made these  remarks  in  a keynote address he  delivered at the 24th Westec sector congress of the Teacher Trainees Association of Ghana (TTAG) held at the Enchi College of Education in the Western North on Monday,  on the theme, ‘Advancing the role of teacher education in Ghana: the impact of government policies.’

“The expired conditions of service for teachers and workers in the Ghana Education Service (GES) have not been reviewed for some years now, resulting in poor working conditions for the teacher. There is also the unsolicited and arbitrary deduction of SIC Insurance premium from salaries of teachers,” the GNAT Regional Secretary complained.

He also spoke about what he described as general disrespect for teachers especially during recent nationwide workshop where teachers were given GH₡35.00 and GH₡50.00 as Travelling and Transport (T and T) for a whole week’s non-residential workshop, noting that “even a demeaning allowance of GH₡50.00 per teacher for the whole week which was promised has not been paid”.

He called on the government through the Ministry of Education to abolish National Service for teacher trainees and post them directly to the schools after completing their training, saying, “I am  at a loss that after all these off-campus teaching practice for almost a year, teacher trainees are still requested to do one year national service before posting”.

Mr Taylor advised teachers to help restore the image of the profession and to advance teacher education in Ghana, stressing, “Continue to project a good image for the profession and teacher education in Ghana and avoid negative tendencies that bring the image of the profession into disrepute”.

FROM CLEMENT ADZEI BOYE, ENCHI

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