Sunyani, Sept. 11, GNA - Mr Stephen Adu, Director of Basic Education Division of Ghana Education Service has urged heads of basic schools to resolve to change attitudes and practices among teachers to help improve performance of pupils.

He said available statistics indicated that pupils were only learning 39 per cent of the time allocated for instructional hours due to teacher absenteeism, teacher commuters and child labour. "Distant education and sandwich programmes, sports and culture and other national day celebrations also constitute a major concern as regard time-on-task," he added.

Mr Adu made the call at the First National Delegates Conference of Heads of Basic Schools in Sunyani.

The day's meeting was under the theme, "Headteacher - The Centrifugal Force in the New Educational Reforms." He said "I am aware that you can do a lot to manage the situation. It is serious and as heads you have to resolve to change the trend to help improve performance of pupils."

Mr Adu stressed that the syllabus was designed within a time frame and if instructional hours were abused there was very little that could improve education delivery in the country. He said heads of schools, teachers, as well as directors of education were all part of the implementation of the education reforms and should ensure their impact were felt because they were part of the solution.

"We need to change our attitude and work hard to improve education delivery. With this we can tell our children that we also contributed to the development of education in the country," he added.

Mr Ignatius Baffour-Awuah, Brong Ahafo Regional Minister, said government was determined to invest in the leadership development of head teachers to achieve quality education in the country. "We need a type of leadership that would effectively manage the increased enrolment resulting from the access expansion initiatives, facilitate the implementation of change initiatives, manage the environment and provide the needed professional support for teachers and pupils," he said.

Mr Baffour-Awuah said government was aware that without the requisite training for heads of basic schools, the country's quest to achieve quality education for all by 2015 would be a mirage. He said government was also aware that motivation levels of heads of educational institutions were far below expectations but asked them to take consolation in the on-going negotiations with the Ghana National Association of Teachers to find a solution to the issue. "It is to motivate heads of basic schools that government has factored a new deal in the proposed Single Spine Salary Structure to add some incentive to their salaries," Mr Baffour-Awuah added. He appealed to Ghana Education Service to review its decision to allow heads of basic schools to play only managerial role and not teach in classrooms, "because it is an inhibitive factor in quality teaching and learning."

Mr D.K. Appawu, National Secretary of Conference in a report, noted that the challenges facing the association were lack of motivation and meagre allowance paid to them.

He called for an increase in the capitation grant paid per child to meet the current realities of the economic situation, and uniformity in the grant at all metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies.