The Minister of State for Tertiary Education, Professor Kwesi Yankah, has urged universities to rebrand distance learning as part of efforts to bring education closer to the people.
“The time is long overdue to indeed rebrand distance learning in Ghana,” he said.
[contextly_sidebar id=”TaTrs5bVqUFvbLGGlIUZEdu4TEx8janL”]“I hereby urge universities to take steps to arrest the perception of low standards of output from distance education programmes, and urge the National Accreditation Board to tighten its vigilance to ensure the maintenance of quality and standards in distance learning,” he added.
Prof. Yankah said this on Friday at a Durbar and Colloquium of the College of Education, University of Ghana (UG), in Accra, as part of activities marking the 70th Anniversary Celebration of the University.
It was on the theme: “Celebrating Excellence, Shaping Futures”.
Prof. Yankah said over the years, distance learning had been successfully adopted the world over “to increase access and make learning flexible for candidates far and near, defying distance, defying time zones and defying social and economic circumstances.”
“It has produced some of the greatest men in history, but it has also been noted to be liable to exploitation and gross abuse in this part of the world.”
He called for the plugging of the loopholes to improve images, stating that “distance learning may be one important channel that could help the country to cope with the overwhelming influx of senior high school graduates likely to knock on the doors of universities, as from 2020”.
On admission of mature students, Prof. Yankah said: “If mature students’ exams for entry to university should be taken more seriously, they should, perhaps, be standardised across board and administered by one credible examining body just like WASSCE (West Africa Senior School Certificate Examination), rather than administered by respective universities using different standards”.
“It is long overdue for the mature student access exam to be rebranded. Yes, we may be in hurry as a nation to revitalise our human resource base in order to effectively drive national development. But we cannot afford schemes that lead to the registration of great strides in enrolment ratios and at the same time make a negative impact on the quality of national productivity.”
–
Source: GNA