“When people take charge of their life choices through education, they gain confidence and strength to exercise voice in demand for their rights. They can better pursue their dreams, contribute to the local economy, and engage in their communities.” — SAVE-Ghana
Ghanaian children are currently estimated to be out of school
or less of children in Ghana are able to read and write after 6 years of schooling
May 2016 End date
Ghana remains the highest investor in educational provision compared to the rest of Sub Saharan Africa and is one of the highest investors globally. Notwithstanding the huge government investment in the education sector, there is growing evidence of numerous corrupt practices that has adversely affected the delivery of quality education to a large majority of citizens - mainly the most vulnerable in the deprived communities.
Notable among the corrupt practices is teacher absenteeism: a 2013 World Bank Report on the education sector in Ghana reveals that 57% of teachers on government payroll are not often present in the classrooms to perform the duties for which they are paid. A lot more teachers earn salary from government payroll and yet do not exist at all - a phenomenon commonly referred to as ghost names.
Moreover, school funds are being misused under the control of school administrators, while there is wide spread evidence that many school teachers in rural communities in Ghana use the school children to work on their farms or provide labour for teachers.
SAVE-Ghana proposes to combat school corruption by building functional structures mobilizing the community to form Parent Teacher Associations (PTAs) and School Management Committees (SMCs) and to have these bodies monitor the schools by using a Community Score Card, a list of school performance indicators and benchmarks.
These approaches will use social audit, community monitoring and participation in order to foster public accountability and responsiveness from school authorities. The PTAs and SMCs are capacity-building mechanism and will foster citizen participation and empowerment.
The Community Score Card (CSC) is a methodology of soliciting communities’ perceptions on quality, efficiency and transparency. The CSC process will enable tracking of expenditures of the capitation grants; monitoring of the performance of teachers; generation of benchmark performance criteria; comparison of performance across schools and generating a direct feedback mechanism between schools and communities.
SAVE-Ghana is a local Ghanaian NGO founded in 2004. The organization works with rural and deprived communities in the Upper West Region with a focus on promoting the quality delivery of basic social services including education, health, women empowerment, sustainable livelihoods for all as well as safe-guarding the rights of women and children in deprived communities.
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