Retired directors of education in the Upper East Region have suggested integration of teaching practice for teacher trainees within the three-year period of training and not after the training.

They said a sandwiched practice and training of teachers provided adequate capacity building for the trainee teacher as against out of school practice which did not allow trained teachers to return to school for evaluation.

The retired educators made the appeal at a press conferences held in Bolgatanga where they met to discuss challenges facing education in the Region.

Mr Robert Ajene, a retired Regional Director of Education who read the statement, said quality of teachers for basic schools was appalling and added that as much as methodology was vital in classroom delivery, the teacher required adequate preparation in terms of content to handle every aspect of the basic school curriculum.

Mr Ajene said rapid changes in Educational Policy of Teacher Trainees did not augur well for the development of education and that contributed to poor performance of teachers.

He said changes in policy in terms of content and duration affected education development, as such policies needed to be entrenched so that no government could change it until at least over 10 years with a national consensus.

He commended the teacher rationalization policy and urged directors to pursue it irrespective of their political affiliation and incentives to go with it.

He said the push for use of Ghanaian languages at basic school had not had the desired effect since Kassem was the only approved examinable language in the Region.

Mr Ajene expressed worry that over 80 per cent of pupils did not write any Ghanaian language as their counterparts in other regions and added that since Gurune cuts across a large sector of the Region the language should be considered.

Mr Emmanuel Samba Zumerkpeh, Regional Director of Education, said Gurune and Kussal languages had been approved by government for use in basic school.

He said though there might be teachers to teach the Gurune language, deficiency of instructors in Kusaal was a challenge and therefore the need to get teachers trained in the language to teach in the schools.