Gomoa Nyanyano (C/R) Feb. 19, GNA - The Member of Parliament for Gomoa East, Mr Richard Sam Quarm, on Monday expressed concern about mushrooming of private schools in the country.

He said some of them were unlicensed, unregistered, unrecognized and in some cases operated from dilapidated structures and were exploiting parents by charging exorbitant fees. Mr Quarm expressed the concern at the launch of the celebration of the Central Regional branch of the Ghana National Association of Private Schools (GNAPS) at Gomoa Nyanyano under theme "Private schools in the new education reforms".

Programmes lined-up for the week-long celebration include, clean-up exercises, lecturers and sporting activities. He said participation of such schools in sporting and extra curriculum activities as well as motivation for teachers were undesirable even though academically some performed better than public schools.

Mr Quarm urged them to provide the necessary logistics to enable them meet the challenges of the new educational reforms. Nana Incoom, Assistant Director at the Gomoa District Directorate of Education, said the Ghana Education Service (GES) would no longer tolerate wholesale promotions in basic schools and that students who failed their examination would be made to repeat their classes. He said students who failed to attend classes after being registered for the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) should not be permitted to write the BECE.

Nana Incoom said during the recent BECE, 13 schools in the district recorded zero percent out of which five were private schools and warned that any school that would come out with zero percent in the future would "face the wrath" of the District Directorate of Education. Mr Hayford Quaye, the Gomoa District chairman of GNAPS, appealed to private schools that had registered with the Efutu-Awutu-Senya District Directorate of Education to rescind their decisions and return to the Gomoa District.

Nana Obeng Wiabo V, chief of Gomoa Nyanyano, who presided urged teachers to set good example for their students to emulate. He also called for support and encouragement for all those who had invested in private schools and that without them many of the youth in the Gomoa area would have found their way onto the streets and beaches. Nana Wiabo suggested that part of the Ghana Education Trust Fund (GETFUND) be allocated to private schools.