No Mahama  E-Blocks  Projects Have Been  Abandoned  –Education Minister Clears The Air

According to him, 124 E- blocks have been started and out of the 124, 23 of them have been completed through Secondary education improvement projects sourcing the fund from the world bank, looking forward to completing the others when funds are available.

Honorable. Adutwum indicated that four E-blocks are going to be operationalized.

This according to him, was because every year the ministry opens E- block, two-story building blocks had been added to the existing E- block at Dome- Kwabenya, Drobonso community senior high school is expected to be completed. 

"This year I'm excited that we're going to open six new schools focusing on STEM, the rest of the stem schools would be opened in 2023", he emphasized.

The education ministry is going to create their own Hollywood where talented individuals would be nurtured to bring out their talent in them and for that matter, creative Art school is currently ongoing in Kumasi at Kwadaso which will be opened in 2023.

He re-emphasized that the NPP government has not given up on the construction of the E-Blocks infrastructure started by the erstwhile Mahama administration.

Giving an update on the status of Ghana’s education, he announced that so far, four new structures of the Blocks have been completed in addition to ones completed by this government since 2017, and they will be used this academic year.

 He assured Ghanaians that, it’s not the intention of this government to stop the construction of those projects more so when the president places so much premium on education.

 “The truth is that those schools that were built in the urban areas have been put to use; for instance, the Dome- Kwabenya which has been expanded and equipped for use. But some of them are sited in the thick forest like the one at Drobonso and other places which are cut away from town.”

The minister showed how some of the schools have become ghost ones as a result of the student's refusal or inability to attend due to distance, lack of facilities, and accommodation, especially for the girls.

He told journalists that some of the schools have turned into boarding schools instead of day schools as a result of distance and transportation challenges.

“The previous government wanted to construct 200 community Day Schools. 124 was started and they are at various stages. 23 of them were donor-funded and were completed but the rest couldn’t be built due to lack of resources. So when people ask me why we are not continuing the Block? My simple answer is, where is the money? But all the same, the government is doing its best to complete a good number of them”, he promised.

The minister made this statement when he addressed the Media on the latest status of the country’s education at the Ministry of Information in Accra on 30th January 2022.

 In addition to the E-Blocks, he disclosed that the government has also constructed many school blocks dotted around every part of the country like dormitories, administration, classroom blocks, science laboratories, etc.

 Six new Modern JHS blocks in some parts of the country, SHS blocks to change the face and structure of the JHS education to truly serve its purpose

 

He further disclosed that 6 new STEM schools are almost completed for use this year.

 The minister buttressed his speech with pictorial evidence of schools projects across the various levels in the country. 

He told journalists that if Ghana doesn’t take a leapfrog approach, it will trail behind and the country needs to do many things in the education sector to be at par with other countries who are ahead of us by 120 years.

“Am happy to announce that the country tertiary enrollment figure has moved up from 18 % to 20 %. Ghana needs to move to 40 % by 2030 and so we must work hard and move faster to meet this target like Canada, South Korea, the UK, US, etc. “

The minister intimated that the president wants quick socio-economic transformation of this country and education is the pathway to achieve that. He mentioned that five new STEM Universities are to be built whiles post-SHS TVET programs will be introduced to serve as hands-on technical subjects for those who want to acquire Technica skills. 

Better still there’s going to be avenues for naturally talented people without formal education to be trained and encouraged to develop God-given talents.

 In this regard, the government is putting up a creative arts school for talented artists like the one in Hollywood in the US.

The Minister touched on almost all the various areas in education from Basic, JHS, SHS TVET, Tech Universities to Universities.

He posited there is going to be a complete overhaul of the Ghanaian education system to be among the best in the world.