Poly Council to be reconstituted

Sept 5, 2008
Page 17

THE Polytechnic Councils of the 10 polytechnics in the country are to be reconstituted by December this year.
This follows the expiration of the mandate of the current Councils.
Appointments to the new Councils have reached advanced stages, and the process for the appointments would soon be completed.
The Chairman of the Conference of Rectors of Polytechnics (CORP), Dr Samuel Obeng Apori, announced this at a news conference in Accra on Wednesday.
The news conference was to formally express the appreciation of the polytechnics to Parliament for passing the Polytechnic Act (Act 745, 2007) and the President, for giving accent to the Act, and to highlight the role of polytechnics in the socio-economic development of the country.
Dr Apori said the polytechnics did not envisage any problem emanating from each polytechnic awarding its own Higher National Diploma (HND) as specified under Act 745 of 2007, saying that what was happening presently was not peculiar to the country alone and that the same applied to other countries.
He said although the original mandate of awarding HND was done by the National Board for Professional and Technicians Examination (NABPTEX), there would not be a complete break from NABPTEX, but a gradual process.
Apart from ensuring quality assurance, he said the polytechnic would ensure that there were standards for all to follow in the award of individual HND.
"The Conference of Rectors of the Polytechnics of Ghana would like to use this occasion to thank the Parliament of Ghana and His Excellency the President for the new Polytechnic Act 745. The polytechnics see the Act as very progressive and one that will enable them to better play their role in national development and, therefore, support it in its entirety," he said.
Dr Apori called for more support from the government, adding that the status of polytechnics, as full-fledged tertiary institutions, placed on them new challenges and responsibilities.
He stressed the urgent need for more human resource development for both teaching and non-teaching staff, and appealed for scholarships for polytechnic staff.
"There is the need for ultra-modern teaching and learning equipment and materials to adequately prepare the students in order to reduce the time needed to adapt to the world of work. When the students have had adequate hands-on and practice-based training, then they become more employable in specific job areas," he said.
Dr Apori said the practical nature of polytechnic education made it capital intensive, and therefore the call by CORP for more financial resources.
He said as part of efforts to attract more science students, the government should consider giving scholarships or subsidies to students pursuing science and mathematics in second-cycle schools.
In addition, he said, science and technology bias students in the polytechnics should be given scholarships and other forms of financial and material rewards as was done for student nurses and teachers, in order to motivate them.
Dr Apori said the attraction and retention of staff had been a challenge to the polytechnics, and that "this was due to the low remuneration and unattractive conditions of service of polytechnic staff which affected the ability of the polytechnics to attract and retain the requisite human resource".
"We highly appreciate efforts made by the government to improve the remuneration of polytechnic staff during the recent salary negotiations. We wish to call on the government to complete the negotiations for conditions of service for various unionised groups in the polytechnics," he emphasised.