Flag bearer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) John Dramani Mahama, has assured that the next NDC government will streamline Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) education across the country, unlike the status quo which has limited the initiative to just some few places.
He says he will parallel the implementation with the construction of more Community Day Senior High Schools, this time around in densely populated urban areas to ameliorate the teeming challenges with the Free Senior High School programme.
Interacting with students of the Wisconsin International University College Wednesday, April 03, 2024, John Mahama underscored the essence of having a facet of STEM education across all disciplines, the reason he wants to streamline it in all Senior High Schools across the country.
To achieve this, John Mahama said he is going to refurbish the old Science Resource Centres in the various SHSs, whilst utilizing the modern labs in the E-blocks as the centres for the STEM centres.
According to him, limiting STEM education to specific areas will not auger well for the country, the reason his administration has resolved to inculcate it into all spheres of the academic process.
“With regard to STEM education, we are going to streamline mainstream STEM education into our educational system. We don’t believe in standalone STEM SHS like this administration is doing. We believe that to get a holistic training, even if you’re studying in the humanities, you need some form of Science and Maths with technical training.
“So, we are going to rehabilitate all the old Science Resource Centres and create them into STEM centres so that all the secondary schools can have access to STEM learning instead of a few secondary schools,” he remarked.
In addressing the Free SHS challenges, he said dormitory blocks are going to be attached to the E-blocks in the catchment areas to cater for students from outside the communities.
“In our efforts to expand access to education, we’ll revisit the initiative of Community Day Senior High Schools which were popularly called the ‘E-blocks’. These schools have been abandoned without any justifiable reason by the current administration. We are going to build more E-block community day schools in high urban population areas,” he noted.
He explained that they will utilise the available lands in the various schools to build the extra edifices since land acquisition in urban areas has become difficult.
John Mahama added that, “with the E-blocks that we have built in rural areas that have a wide catchment area, we will provide dormitory blocks so that children who come from outside where the community is, will have a place to stay while they learn.”
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