By: Samuella Quartey
Minister of Education, Dr. Osei Yaw Adutwum has charged tertiary institutions to take into consideration general educational requirements to customize the education system to suit the different categories of people who enroll in these institutions.
Dr. Adutwum said universities must reinvent themselves to become more versatile and agile to facilitate the transformational agenda and needs of the country.
He said they should do their part by transforming students to become useful to society so that they can churn out high-caliber graduates to propel the human resource base of the country.
Dr. Adutwum said these at the inauguration of the Boards of the University of Cape Coast and the University of Education, Winneba in Accra.
Before the advent of Private Universities, there existed three public universities namely; University of Ghana, University College of Cape Coast and the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology. These Universities were established to propel the human resource base of the country and also make young graduates competitive on the job market.
With the passage of time, it became necessary to design new faculties in these universities to teach different courses and programmes for instance the University of Cape Coast which trained only teachers now has faculties for medicine, communication and information studies, law, school of business whiles the University of Education, Winneba also has faculties like political science department, business administration, psychology among others.
It is to make these institutions advanced and excel in their areas of study to meet international standards that two boards were inaugurated to steer the affairs of the University of Cape Coast and University of Education, Winneba for the next four years.
Sector Minister Dr. Yaw Osei Adu-Twum tasked these boards to focus on their core mandate and not be complacent.
The Council should be interested in the curriculum and mission of the university. He noted that they should not be discouraged by processes and attempts to misinform government apparatus and the political machinery.
The University of Cape Coast Board which has a membership of 15 is chaired by Professor Obeng whiles that of Winneba of Education is chaired by Nana Ofori Ansah. It has a membership of 17.