Feature Article of Sunday, 20 March 2005 Columnist: Gye Nyame Concord

Funding Tertiary Education In Ghana

Education continues to be a major problem for this country, with experts wondering how to solve the hydra-headed problems confronting us in that sector. In the first part of this article, Appiah Kubi, looks at the issue of education and seeks way to examine it. ?I am far from poverty not because I was born into a rich family but because Dr. Nkrumah gave me education? Dr. Edward Mahama PNC Over the last few years, the vexed issue of funding tertiary education in the country has become a contentious one. The government?s funding of tertiary education started in 1948 when, the University College of Gold Coast, now University of Ghana was established to produce the manpower requirements of the country. During that era, university students were treated as first-born babies and were provided with almost everything, including pocket money by the government, just to ensure that the needed psychological and physiological comfort was obtained for smooth scholarly work. However, the issue of government as the sole financier of tertiary education came under the microscope of Dr. Busia?s government in 1970 when a committee was set up to advise the government on the future policy direction of the government?s financial support to the universities. Nevertheless, almost thirty years after the birth of Busia?s committee on funding tertiary education in the country, the issue is still as controversial as before. Although, the government has acknowledged the role of university education and the acquisition of critical skills such as teaching, engineering, medicine, and accounting among others needed for socio-economic development, it has clearly stated its inability to act as the sole financier of tertiary education due to economic constraints coupled with the fact that, there are equally important sectors of the economy that need to be catered for, hence it came out with a white paper on tertiary education in 1992 which stated that ?? government alone cannot continue to bear the increasing cost of higher education and therefore, there was the need for cost sharing by all stakeholders?. In spite of the fact that the past decades have seen a relative rise in government?s recurrent expenditure on education from 17% in 1981 to 36% and 41% in 1992 and 1994 respectively (Report on National Forum on Funding Tertiary Education, Akosombo, January 27-28 1997), the trend did not continue as the government, bent on promoting cost sharing decreased its expenditure on tertiary education. Thus, in 1996 the government, leading to a short fall of 26.3% or 16 billion cedis, provided only 73.7 % of the total amount needed to fund tertiary education. In 1997, the amount provided was 61.5% of the total amount required resulting in a deficit of 38.5%. The deficit however, rose to 40% in 1999. These figures amply testified to the government?s commitment in reducing expenditure on tertiary education, perhaps in

fulfilment of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank?s sponsored adjustment programme with its emphasis on drastic cuts on public expenditure including that on education. In 1998, the government decided that it could no longer continue with periodical subventions and grants to cover the payment of students? residential and academic user fees because of budgetary constraints and therefore asked students to pay the fees in respect of the usage of residential and academic facilities. This prompted some serious reactions from university students not only through the exchange of broadsides and trading of accusations but also through street demonstrations and other forms of protestations. Against the background of rising cost of tertiary education with its attendant problem of rising enrolment, the problem of funding tertiary education, reached its elastic limit during the beginning of 2000/2001 academic year when the Committee of Principals and Vice Chancellors (CVCPs) through an advertised statement in the daily newspapers (Daily Graphic and Ghanaian Times) threatened to close down the universities or cut down their admission intake till a solution is found to the chronic under-funding of the universities and other tertiary institutions as a result of starvation of budgetary allocations to the tertiary sector. Despite the fact that, the 1992 constitution makes it mandatory for the government to fund education from the basic level to the tertiary level, it has become clear that the government is not ready to fund it alone. Frustrations Of Tertiary Authorities Authorities of tertiary education have also over the years bitterly complained about the dwindling budgetary allocation to the tertiary institutions, yet the government has indicated its inability to single-handedly bear the cost of tertiary education at the expense of equally important sectors of the economy. Another area that has been of concern to tertiary education authorities has been the increase in demand for tertiary education over the last few years as against the limited entry opportunities at the tertiary level. Although, the development budget of education increased about seven fold from ? 2.024 million in 1993 to ? 15,600 million in 1996, the rapid development and heavy expenditure are still not adequate to cater for the problem of funding tertiary education especially, higher education. Methods of funding education have never been uniformed all over the world. Every country either developed or developing finances her educational system considering so many factors. Some of these factors that countries take into consideration before drawing up policies on funding education, are principally the nature of the economy, the ideological perception of the country, the philosophy behind the education system and the values that a particular society attaches to education vis-?-vis national development. Despite these factors, funding of tertiary education has been a difficult issue in Ghana. Tertiary institutions in the country have over the years been starved of both adequate development and recurrent expenditure making it impossible for them to operate at full and efficient capacity.

Delivering a paper on ?private participation in tertiary education at the Pearson, - Osea Appreciation Lecture at Accra in November 1998, Prof. S. K. Agyepong, then Vice Chancellor of University of Cape Coast cautioned, that if the problem of funding tertiary education is not addressed quickly, it would lead to the demise of certain academic departments in the existing public universities and other tertiary institutions. Addressing the seventh matriculation ceremony of the Accra Polytechnic in January 2000, Dr. Baah Boakye, Principal of the Polytechnic also complained that inadequate government subvention, irregular disbursement of the subventions and the disproportionate contribution by direct beneficiaries as well as the industrial and private sector, have all contributed to make the sustained and viable funding of tertiary institutions very difficult and noted that funding remains one of the greatest obstacles and constraint to capacity building of the nation. This perhaps, sums up the frustration of chief executives of tertiary institutions in the country over the inadequate tertiary education funding. Tertiary Education In Perspective As we have entered the 21st century, higher education worldwide finds itself in a paradoxical situation. On one hand, it is witnessing an unprecedented growth. Enrolments are on the increase and so are the expectations placed on it by society. The correlation between investment in higher education and research and the level of social, economic and cultural development of nations, is well established and is gaining increasing grounds, at a time when all developments have become knowledge intensive. On the other hand, higher education is in a state of crisis in practically all countries of the world under the pressure of serious financial constraints. It has to compete for public fund with many other sectors and very often, it is among the first to undergo severe cuts. These cuts have reached a dramatic threshold in developing countries especially. Even though it is accepted that education financing is a problem all over the world, particularly in the developing countries, Ghana seems to have a greater share of the problem with education, competing for the meagre national resources with equally important sectors. Nonetheless, several other countries have also suffered in the tertiary education crisis that Ghana is grappling with. The World Bank (1989) stated that, the development challenge posed for tertiary education in Africa is in one important respect, more daunting than that posed for lower education and that rare growth for public resources for the educational sector as a whole in most developing countries, is unlikely to keep pace with the growth of the population. The World Bank blamed the scarcity of funding tertiary education throughout the sub-region on the tragic consequences of economic downturn and the concomitant constriction in public budget that has seriously undermined the quality of education in Africa?s universities. To improve the share of stagnant rare public education expenditures devoted to tertiary education and in order to stem the deterioration that threatens the ability of most African institutions of higher learning to contribute to development, the World Bank chronicled recommendations such as fee-paying in universities, elimination of allowances, rationalization of programmes and faculties, assigning to non-public sources the full cost of housing and other welfare sources provided to students and staff, reduction of non teaching staff amongst others in order to save the universities from collapse.

In a similar World Bank report titled ?Cost And finance of Higher Education In Pakistan? published in 1991, the report noted that, the heavy dependence on federal grants by universities in the country, has historically left many universities under-funded in higher education and as such they have continuously received 30% of their budgetary request, les than 70% of what they needed to help keep the universities on track. This allocation to the universities, the report further noted, has made the universities to run at deficits affecting the quality of university education, consistent planning, standard of achievement and invariably affecting the expenditure per student. With reference to higher education in the Republic of Yemen, ?The University of Sanaa?, published by the World Bank in 1991, it pointed out that despite the deterioration of the country?s macro financial position between 1987 and 1990, the University has continued to depend on the inability of the government to provide adequate resources through a standardized budgetary framework and consequently affecting planning, effective and efficient university delivery system. The report regretted the situation whereby the university?s recurrent expenditure is negotiated on an adhoc basis and therefore, suggested the means for the creation of an effective diversification of sources of funding of the university in order to promote greater internal efficiency and optimal performance in the university?s planning and programmes. However, despite the fact that the government?s expenditure on education increased from 11.2% in 1978 to 20.3% in 1989, the report was not happy of the growth at the expense of other social welfare programmes and economic imbalance in the country. From the foregoing, it was clear that the World Bank, which is the largest source of external finance for education in developing countries, accounting for a quarter (1/4) of all external support since 1963 will cut it?s support despite contributing $19.2 billion over the past thirty years in more than 100 countries. Today, the total volume of lending to support education in developing countries is about $2.0 million a year. This is supported by the fact that the bank?s lending for university and polytechnic education which peaked at 36% of the total lending in mid 1980?s has fallen to 26%, an indication of the fact that it is reducing its support as the largest external donor in developing countries as a condition for social and economic aid and support. Accordingly, the World Bank in (1995) said increasing public spending on education is not necessary in many cases because of the enormous potential of efficiency gained at current levels in developing countries. Public education in Africa, which has the lowest enrolment ratio than any region in the world, yet represents a greater share of Gross National Product of 4.2% of the African economies. The bank stressed that, the trend has frequently put increasing pressure on public funds and at the same time has resulted in general fiscal difficulties, macro economic imbalances in some developing
http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/features/artikel.php?ID=77639 Accessed 21/02/2012

FUNDING EDUCATION OR POLITRICKING EDUCATION

By Malik Adam Gariba

Former local NUGS President University of Ghana - Malik Adam Gariba When things go wrong, PUSH; pray until something happens. By: Delle Tuotol Alfred More Quotes | Submit Quote All persons shall have the right to equal educational opportunities and facilities and with view to achieving the full realization of the right. (a)basic education shall be free ,compulsory and available to all; (b)secondary education in its different forms, including technical and vocational education, shall be made generally available and accessible to all by every appropriate means ,and in particular ,by the progressive introduction of free education. (1992 const,art 25; a & b) As it has been suggested in the time past; if education is expensive, let's try ignorance. It is my firm conviction just as many Ghanaians that Ghana is committed to rejecting ignorance at all cost .This is supported by the fact that about 40% of the national budget is committed to education. Also, GETfund is set up to fund education and above all about 2.5 %of the national GDP is spent on education .All these jesters are to drive home the point, no matter how expensive education is, ignorance cannot be an option for Ghana. All said and done, with all these arrangements towards funding education, can we satisfactorily conclude that standards in our basic and second cycle educational institutions are things to write home about? If your guess is as good as mine, then, the setting up of the Anamor mensah committee was long over due. When an educational system has been in operation as long as that of the JSS and SSS, with its attended problems; when out of the 95.2% pupils enrolled in the primary schools, only 78.8% continue to the JSS and out of this; only 52% continue to SSS and out of this; only 2.3% continue to the university (fellew, IMANE Ghana on Agenda TV3, 2009.), it was only proper and a mark of commitment to duty to have the system reviewed. In reviewing such an institution, quality control measure should be the cardinal principles that must dictate the modus operandi of the entire exercise.

After the committees' work, with the sense of ensuring good standards, two issue dominated the committee report -extension of the duration versus maintaining the status quo with adequate funding -as some of the ways of ensuring good standards .The government at that time(NPP), in a white paper, opted for extension of the duration . The NPP government explained that the strength of the economy could not support the needed investment in the second cycle educational institutions. Even though, at this same period, the NPP government wanted Ghanaians to believe that they had managed the economy (not ecomini!!!)so well that the cedi was unprecedentedly stable, inflation solidly stabilized, lending rate attractive with enviable growth rate record of 6.5% of GDP and above all with an expanded economy from GH 3.4 to 16 billion .Yet the government at that time could afford such belligerent audacity and told Ghanaians they could not find money to fund education .However, In their stupid honest mood they argue that it will be unfair, disgusting and disastrous to still keep the status quo without the needed investment, hence they opted to extend the duration from three to four years until such a time the economy can support such investment. Every objective and keen observer will agree with the facts that the NPP government has not been unpunished for this attitude of not funding education. Infect, the group that called for the head of the NPP government to roll and made most political capital out of the government`s white paper on the committee report was the then minority party (NDC) now in government .The NDC made it a campaign issue and included it in their manifesto. In 2009 when NDC won the 2008 general election and the party to form government, the current minister of education, Mr Alex Tetteh Enyo ,then a nominee designate for the ministry of education, was heard on a Joy FM radio to have stated that the government of the day(NDC) will reverse the senior high school from four years to three years. During his vetting, when he was confronted with the truth at the vetting committee, he was so undecided whether to desert a sinking ship for the one that might not float, in such dilemma, he designed a scheme that has further worsened the plight of the educational budget by calling for educational forum which was an exercise in futility ab initio. As the sayings goes coming events cast their shadows. So it did not come to many of us as a surprise when the forum failed to reach consensus .Infect ,speaking to daily graphic, Prof Anamuah- Mensah, said he was not delighted that the work of committee members that involved several man hours and resource ,as well as travels to all districts in the country for views ,had been set aside for fresh resources to be committed into a forum on just the duration of the SHS(Daily Graphics,may,27,2009). For every keen observer will go with the assertion that NDC was in support of the argument that the senior high school must be reduced to three years during and after the forum, which presupposes that they were committed to adequately funding education. It must be emphasized that the three years proposal was with conditionality's- adequate investment. Infect this proposal was the technical team`s view; However, the other proposal for extension of the duration was from the conference of heads of assisted secondary schools (CHASS) because from experience governments have always paid lip service to funding education putting CHASS under unnecessary pressure. At this juncture, I will speak to responsibility, commitment, and honor. I will speak to integrity and accountability .I will speak to the obligation of command and leadership. And I will speak to how I found these qualities missing in our governments to providing quality education to Ghanaian citizenry. This article is not a personal attack on the current government. It will not be a sordid recounting of ineptitude and inertia. The NDC government is in charge of the republic of Ghana today. This article is a frank indictment

from an obvious patriotic, honest eye witness of the failure by the government to lead our country with responsibility and decisiveness. Instead, the government of the day is leading the country in ways that is directly and severely harming the second cycle educational institutions .I do not mean to arrogate to myself the viewpoint of an educational expert. But how can the NDC government give an indication that it was committed to investing in education, by supporting the argument to reverse the senior high school`s four to three years. Just within a space of months, turn round to refuse CHASS the funding they needed to run the government assisted schools. The ongoing negotiations on the increment of feeding fees, in view of what government is offering, is most disgusting just to say the least. Any honest government committed to investing in education will not offer to give GH 1.2 for three square meals which cannot feed even a mosquito for a meal not to talk of students. Infact according to UN and poverty survey standards, persons spending less than a dollar a day are considered as persons living in abject poverty. Is our government condemning our students to abject poverty, after the huge savings the government has made from cutting down the size of government, doing away with profligate and ostentatious expenditure and above all the drastic reduction of governmental travels and long convoy (not on petroleum)? When CHASS only requested for GH1.8 and even drastically reduced it to GH 1.5, Government do not see this as a matter of fulfilling his oath and good faith towards posterity, but rather has assumed such a belligerent attitude .When there is a credible survey that reveal that all the SHS student are anemic and malnourished .Infect according to the survey, 80% and 20%of the students meals are carbohydrate and protein respectively(Joy FM news night June ,2009) .Yet on daily basis ,we are visited with gab from these TV ministers, who are suppose to have known better how nutrients are vital to child development , and accept the fact that this peanut government has provided is not enough. In their height of naivety to be well behaved boys to their pay masters , they are strangely asking the schools to supplement their meals from the school garden`s produce: completely forgotten that lack of tools, lack of workshops and lack of lands for agricultural practical were some of the serious lapses that threaten the survival of JSS and SSS program. If we allow our ministers to be defending government policies in the manner like these TV ministers are doing, when travelers are told that they are ministers of state, they might begin to comprehend how Egyptians worshipped an insect. I do not pretend to speak for the Ghana Education Service or members of CHASS.I offer this unique point of view as a patriot and a career concerned Ghanaian, who is at the receiving end of government insincerity and indecisions. A patriotic Ghanaian's commitment demands that he submits his personal wants and needs completely to the greater good, and in that spirit, I have no personal ax to grind; I have no political agenda; my focus is on the duties of those in government and a basic execution of their mandate that any Ghanaian should be able to expect .And I know that greater good is demonstrably not served by both present and past government, when they put up personal and parochial comfort and leisure above the over all national interest.
http://www.modernghana.com/news/226823/1/funding-education-or-politricking-education.html accessed 21/02/2012

Ghana grapples with university fees

National debate is launched over "cost-sharing" dilemmas By Ernest Harsch in Accra

At a campus that has known many demonstrations over the years, several hundred university and secondary students packed a lecture hall at the University of Ghana on 2 May, clenched fists pumping in the air. Instead of the customary anti-government slogans, the student leaders called out, "Support the fund!" The crowd repeatedly responded with a chorus of, "Invest in education!" They then set off on a march and motorcade through the streets of the capital to solicit broader public backing for the Ghana Education Trust Fund. The fund, currently under consideration by Parliament, is one innovative response to the financial strains afflicting Ghana's schools, from the primary level up through the universities. It has become patently clear to many Ghanaians that the government, despite significant budgetary allocations, simply cannot keep up with the rising costs of education or the growing public demand for more schools, of better quality. How to pay for education has been a politically sensitive issue in Ghana, especially at the universities, where students are wellorganized and are accustomed to free tuition. In late 1999 students briefly went on strike to protest rising "user fees," the charges that university administrations levy on students for accommodations, meals and use of laboratories and libraries. The University of Ghana, Legon, just on the edge of Accra, is the country's pride. Founded a half-century ago, it has produced many outstanding scholars and leaders, some known across the continent and internationally. But while Legon remains in relatively better condition than many campuses in Africa, it too is feeling the strains: classrooms and dorms are overcrowded, the libraries have few new books or journals, laboratories lack essential equipment, and the faculty is poorly paid. The government faces difficult choices. Since 1992, the constitution mandates free and compulsory basic education for all. With about 30 per cent of Ghanaian children still unable to attend primary school, this means that more of the education budget must shift to lowerlevel schools. As a result, "there is not much left to go around," notes Deputy Minister of Education Mohamed Ibn Chambass, who is responsible for higher education. "The moral issue is very sharp," Mr. Chambass told Africa Recovery. "Do you spend more money to increase the education of those who are privileged enough to have primary, secondary, and now tertiary education? Or do you limit funding at the tertiary level and concentrate on getting the 30 per cent enrolled, who would otherwise be condemned to illiteracy?" At the same time, he added, "we know that higher education has such a great impact on the process of growth and development, that we should not minimize its importance."

Higher education is essential if Ghana and other African countries are ever to solve their problems of food security, health, good governance and other developmental priorities, adds Mr. George Benneh, a former vice-chancellor of the University of Ghana and currently chairman of the National Council for Tertiary Education (NCTE). "Unless we have welltrained, skilled people from our universities and science and technology institutes, Africa will continue to depend on outsiders," he says.
Universities under strain

According to NCTE enrolment figures, the universities' financial constraints have been compounded by a sharp rise in the number of students over the past decade, a veritable "massification of student intake," as Mr. Benneh calls it. This increase reflects in part the growing population of secondary-school graduates, many of whom would like to go on to the tertiary level. In the 1990/91 academic year, Ghana's three existing universities (University of Ghana, University of Science and Technology in Kumasi and University of Cape Coast) had a total student enrolment of 9,997. By 1998/99, their combined student population had rocketed up to 26,394. In addition, the new University College of Education in Winneba and the University of Development Studies in Tamale, in the north, had another 5,107 students, bringing the overall total to 31,501 (see graph, next page). Despite this increase, notes Mr. Chambass, the universities still can admit only 25-30 per cent of those who qualify, even with very strict admissions standards. Beyond some cosmetic improvements, the universities' infrastructures have not appreciably expanded over the same period. This has brought deteriorating conditions and quality, with too few facilities and faculty to handle the larger student body. Just to meet basic maintenance costs, much less any expansion, the universities have been obliged to increase various student charges. Many students acknowledge the need for such charges, but bristle at their rising levels, arguing that those from poorer families are finding it difficult to meet the expense. While they accept "cost sharing" in principle, they insist that the government and other sources assume the lion's share. Mr. Emmanuel Adjei Domson, president of the National Union of Ghana Students (NUGS), believes that part of the problem lies with the economic policies prescribed by the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF). The government, he told a high-level National Education Forum in November 1999, has failed to sufficiently fund education "just to meet and satisfy World Bank and IMF conditionalities" limiting public expenditures. He asserted that higher education is "a public asset for the public good," and that "education is not a commercial commodity but a social service and should never be operated on the principles and assumptions of market fundamentalism."

Trust fund

To help generate new financing for education, the NUGS had proposed for several years that a special trust fund be established. In January 1999 President Jerry Rawlings incorporated the proposal into his annual address to Parliament, and a technical committee subsequently recommended its broad outlines. Parliament currently is negotiating the specifics of the Ghana Education Trust Fund, designed to raise about 200 bn cedis ($54 mn) in additional educational financing annually. How the fund's resources will be raised and allocated are not yet finalized, and certain aspects are controversial. Some have proposed raising the current 10 per cent value-added tax (VAT) by another 2 per cent, with half the additional amount going to the fund. A VAT increase, however, will likely be unpopular with the general public. The NUGS, while supporting the fund overall, has dissociated itself from the tax-increase proposal, suggesting instead that 1 per cent of the existing VAT be reallocated to education. Less controversially, some have proposed new taxes on alcohol, tobacco, entertainment, hotels and other activities, levies on business earnings, an "educational lottery," and voluntary contributions, from individuals, churches, corporations, alumni associations and local communities. Prominent individuals in Ghana's three impoverished northern regions, where enrolment is especially low, are organizing a comparable fund to benefit students in and from the north. Numerous local government assemblies are putting together scholarship programmes for particularly needy or disadvantaged students. Only part of the national fund will go toward the universities. The Ministry of Education has proposed that 40 per cent of the fund's resources be allocated to basic education, with the remainder divided evenly between secondary and tertiary institutions. Parliament, however, may decide to alter the formula. The government may be keen to use the trust fund to bail out the student loan scheme, which has accumulated a large debt due to unpaid loans (in part because university graduates have had a hard time finding suitable jobs). But many Ghanaian educators would prefer that a significant portion of the fund be used to upgrade infrastructure and hire more faculty. Whatever the precise outcome, the process of launching the fund has set off a national dialogue over education financing. It is not limited to parliamentarians and government officials alone, but involves the NUGS and other student organizations, teachers' unions, school administrators and countless individuals concerned about the state of Ghana's schools. Women educators have used the opportunity to press for ways to improve female enrolment and performance rates, including at the senior secondary and university levels. Mr. Abednego Kofi Agyepong, the Greater Accra regional chairman of the Ghana National Association of Teachers, sees this heightened public interest as one of the fund's most positive features: "The creation of awareness is a step in the right direction."

Mixed signals from donors

Since 1987, donors have contributed $65 mn to tertiary education in Ghana, including $45 mn from the World Bank for its 1993-98 Tertiary Education Project. The World Bank, which currently has no active higher education undertaking in Ghana, judged its earlier project as only "marginally satisfactory." In its view, university enrolments grew too rapidly, without commensurate attention to sustainable funding mechanisms or a "coherent" overall programme beyond basic education. The latter criticism is shared by some Ghanaian experts. Ghana very much needs an overarching "master plan" for education which integrates its different components, argues Mr. Baffour Agyeman-Duah, associate executive director of the Centre for Democracy and Development, a non-governmental thinktank. Once a "credible programme to provide good quality higher education at a sustainable cost" is in place, says Ms. Janet Leno, the World Bank's senior education specialist in Accra, "donors will be more than glad to come in to support this important effort." Not all donors, however. Some officials have tended to question the value of higher education in Africa, stressing basic education instead. Such a simple counterposition stirs anger in Accra. Ghanaians should be able to develop their talents to "the highest level," says Mr. Joseph Abbey, executive director of the Centre for Policy Analysis, a respected development policy research body. "Why should we, in sports, be able to compete with the best in the world, but when it comes to developing other talents, somebody says that it is inappropriate?" He wondered whether donors wanted Africa to remain dependent on foreign technical assistance, thus ensuring continued jobs for their own nationals. Addressing the donors "who think that what is good for Africa is only basic education," Mr. Benneh asked in similar terms: "Do you want Africans to be just hewers of wood and drawers of water, or to advance?" Given Africa's development needs and the rapidly evolving world economy, he concluded, "We need higher education to move into the new era."
http://www.un.org/ecosocdev/geninfo/afrec/vol14no2/ghana.htm accessed 21/02