Dr. Clement Apaak, the Deputy Ranking Member on Parliament’s Education Committee, has made it clear that former President John Dramani Mahama opposes the drafting of teacher licensure tests rather than teacher licencing itself.
Mahama pledged to do away with the licensure tests while on his ‘Building Ghana Tour’ in the Bono Region, claiming that teacher candidates didn’t need to take an additional test to be qualified.
Several organisations, such as the Colleges of Education Teachers Association of Ghana (CETAG), which uphold the significance of the tests, have sharply criticised his pledge.
In an interview with Umaru Sanda Amadu on Eyewitness News on Citi FM on Monday, Dr. Apaak said, “John Dramani Mahama is not opposed to licensing teachers; he is not opposed to teachers being professionals, and he is not opposed to adopting and following best practices. But we are opposed to the current practices, which is the decision not actually backed by the Teaching Act, that for one to be certified as a professional teacher and licensed, one has to write a licensure exam.”
“So it is important to distinguish and delineate between licensing teachers as professionals and saying that teachers must write an exam called a licensure exam, pass, and on the basis of that be given a license.”
Similarly, the Communications Officer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Sammy Gyamfi, has asserted that the exams were a ploy by the current administration to suppress teacher recruitment.
Mahama had explained thatteacher trainees already undergo rigorous four-year Bachelor of Education programs, encompassing at least 50 courses and eight semesters of intensive study and rigorous assessment via exams.
He, therefore, questioned the need for an additional exam after such comprehensive training.
