The government’s flagship Free SHS Senior High School (SHS) program has been criticized by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for having inadequate target populations.
This statement was included in the Fund’s most recent country report on Ghana, whose request for a $3 billion bailout it recently granted.
The report states that although the Free SHS policy is inadequately targeted, it does cover the entire cost of secondary education.
The IMF also revealed that although Ghana spends close to 4% of its GDP on education, learning outcomes are not great despite high enrollment.
The IMF has identified many key areas for potential improvement in education spending, including bolstering primary education resources, improving teacher preparation programs, and increasing performance-based funding procedures.
According to Facultynews’ investigations, the Free SHS initiative has received fiscal support of more over GH11.3 billion since 2019.
The administration showed its dedication in the 2023 budget by announcing that the Free SHS Program would continue to be implemented without hesitation.
The government would “continue with the enactment of the Free SHS Programme and strive to facilitate access to various educational items” this year, according to the statement, which also noted that “the total number of beneficiaries the moment hovers at 1.3 million students for the 2021/22 academic year. “As for President Mahama, he has been contradictory in his stance on the free SHS policy, according to President Akufo-Addo, who spoke at a rally organized by the New Patriotic Party ahead of a byelection in Kumawu on May 23.
He claims that the NDC flagbearer has changed his position from calling for the program’s cancellation to calling for its expansion to include private second-cycle institutions.
He added that the contradictions do not make the former president Mahama reliable.
A review of the free senior high school policy is still conceivable, according to Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta in July 2022.
He elucidated that the Education Ministry is still investigating the idea in an effort to figure out how to include parents in a non-coercive way.
