This intervention has been met with a lot of mixed reactions and personally I think teacher trainee allowance is a waste of state funds.
Dr. Kwame Nkrumah introduced teacher trainee allowance because of the disinterest of people becoming teachers. Today, the purpose of the allowance has been defeated since the number of enrollment increased when the teacher trainees allowance was canceled or replaced with the SLTF in 2015. Therefore I find it hard to comprehend why the state should pay a group of students for schooling.
It’s recorded that an amount of ¢432M has been paid as allowance since 2017(source coenewsportal.com) while my dear country Ghana still lacks basic educational infrastructure. Schools in some parts of Ghana lack basic and important materials to facilitate learning. A typical example is a horrible experience I had during my out program, generally known as Off-campus teaching practice at Oyarifa Presbyterian Primary A and B in Accra. A small classroom block has over 70 pupils with limited tables and chairs. They are packed like sardines in the heat. They lack a lot and any good Samaritan can pay them a visit to help.
The defenders will say Rome was not built in a day but to me, Rome can’t be built when resources meant to build Rome is channeled into other unnecessary things like the payment of the allowance. I strongly believe that these huge sums of monies can be used to build new schools or complete the existing ones which will even enable these college graduates to gain quick employment after school and also help eliminate the double-track system in a year or two.
Finally, I suggest we introduce an SLTF without a guarantor system in our various colleges to enable susceptible people to access the funds just like it’s done in our various tertiary institutions.
In conclusion, this write-up does not aim at scoring any political point. It’s solely an opinion of mine that was generated from a sober reflection of my experience in the field. That’s the hard truth, it hurts but heals –
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