Accra, Feb 23, GNA - The Ghana Young Men Christian Association (YMCA) has appealed to the government to address without delay the inadequate funding of public schools to reverse the poor quality of education in the country. Mr Prosper Hoeyi, National General Secretary of Ghana YMCA, said public schools, which had in the past set high standards, had become subjects of ridicule because of the poor quality of education. "We are all now avoiding them like a kind of deadly virus and sending our children to private schools. Gradually, quality education is becoming associated with the ability to pay which does not bode well for us as a nation," he said. Mr Hoeyi was speaking during a visit of a group of students from the Millennium High School in New York. The group is on an education trip to Ghana.

The students offered communal labour in Wawase, undertook a clean up exercise at a market in Kumasi and donated a English, Mathematics and Science textbooks to the Afia Kobi Ampem Girls High School in the Ashanti Region. Mr Hoeyi said the government must act quickly to ensure that quality education was available to all to bridge the gap between public and private schools.

He said equal attention must also be given to technical and vocational education to meet the needs of the over 200,000 High School graduates who aere unable to qualify to enter Senior High Schools every year. Mr Hoeyi said it was unfortunate that technical and vocational skills training had remained at the fringes of school curriculum years after the educational reforms were initiated.

"Our economy needs more of the people with practical skills rather than those with academic disposition," he said and called on government to revisit the JSS concept and see how best to mainstream vocational and technical skills for every child to acquire some skills irrespective of academic qualification.