Kumasi, Feb. 09, GNA - About 15,000 Certificate "A" Teachers leave the classroom each year for further studies, thereby creating vacancies that are difficult to fill, Professor Akwasi Asabere-Ameyaw, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Education, Winneba, has said. This, he said, calls for regular training for adequate number of teachers for the ever increasing primary sector of education in the country.

Professor Asabere-Ameyaw said this at the matriculation ceremony of the sixth batch of diploma in Basic Education by Distance held in Kumasi on Saturday.

The Vice-Chancellor said a total of 3,800 distance learners were admitted at the level 100 of the diploma in distance education programme last year.

He indicated that a total of 2,880 students are matriculating with 1,364 from the northern sector and 1,516 from the southern sector with over 70 per cent being females.

He emphasized that the distance education programme would enable the educational system to respond to the national need to train as many teachers as possible for the pre-tertiary level while at the same time keeping them in the classroom during the period of the programme. Professor Steve Sobotie, Principal of the College of Technology Education noted that distance learning had become the latest mode of knowledge acquisition throughout the world.

He made mention of a library equipped with relevant books, an Information Communication Technology (ICT) and internet facilities available on the campus to enhance research and learning capabilities of students.

The Principal said the Kumasi Campus also runs a two-year diploma programme in Vocational and Technical Education by distance, adding that, 37 pioneer students of the programme would graduate this year. Professor Sobotie hinted that it was the strategic policy of the College to contribute immensely to the government policy of training more qualified teachers to help make the educational reform a success.