GES does not prescribe punishment for pregnant girls – Director
Mr Stephen Adu, the Director of the Ghana Education Service (GES) in-charge of Basic Education, has said GES did not have a policy to punish girls who get pregnant whiles in school.
He said such girls must be treated equally like any other student or pupil and he has directed school heads not to mete out any punishment to such girls.
He said this was to set the record straight with regards to recent media reports which quoted a District Director of Education calling for punishment to be meted out to girls who got pregnant whiles in school.
Mr Adu said this in Tamale on Thursday at the launch of a five-year Strategic Plan (2013 – 2018) developed by School for Life, a non-governmental organization, which focuses on providing Complementary Basic Education (CBE) in the country.
The plan, which focuses on five strategic priority areas – delivering, demonstrating and promoting CBE, education advocacy and policy change, civil society coordination and participation – is to contribute to the overall strategic goal and mission of School for Life to improve access to relevant quality education in the country.
Inputs from major stakeholders in CBE amongst others were sought to develop the five-year strategic plan.
Mr Adu said the GES recognized that pregnancy was associated with health implications and therefore it (GES) only impressed on parents to take custody of their pregnant children until they delivered before returning to school.
He said school girls could not be faulted for getting pregnant and that a lot of factors contributed to this situation. “The girls must not be punished when they find themselves in this manner.”
Alhaji A.B.A Fuseini, the Deputy Northern Regional Minister, called for a strong partnership between the government and NGOs to work effectively to improve standard of education in the country to enable the country to attain the Millennium Development Goals.
Alhaji Fuseini commended School for Life for its efforts at imparting knowledge to pupils who otherwise would have been out of school.
Mr Hussein Abdulai Ziblim, Deputy Manager in-charge of Operation of School for Life, said the development of the strategic plan was indicative that School for Life would continue to work in partnership with all key stakeholders in education to offer quality education for children for effective development.
Source: GNA