Accra, May 18, GNA - Dr Dominic Pealore, Director of Statistics, Research, Information Management and Public Relations (SRIMPR) Division of the Ministry of Education, on Tuesday said the Ministry would endeavour to ensure that information on educational policies are made available stakeholders who need them without hindrance. "We are going to revamp and strengthen the SRIMPR Unit to ensure effective and smooth dissemination of all educational policies even to the grassroots," he said.

Addressing participants at a seminar in Accra on how to effectively disseminate information on the country's educational policies, he bemoaned instances where educational policies were not fully implemented especially at the grassroots due to ineffective dissemination. The two-day seminar under the theme:" Enhancing Information Management in the Education Sector" was attended by about 40 Metropolitan, Municipal and District Directors of Education, as well as representatives from the Department for International Development (DFID) of the United Kingdom (UK). Dr Pealore urged the participants to dispassionately discuss the issue and come out with workable solutions to improve the country's educational system.

He expressed appreciation to the US Agency for International Development (USAID) for sponsoring the seminar.

Ms. Denise Clarke, Country Programme Facilitator of Global e-Schools and Communities Initiative (GeSCI) called for the initiation of implemental policies, use of appropriate technology and motivated staff to ensure that policies developed by stakeholders in education reached the grassroots. She urged participants to come out with an agreed framework for an integrated information and communication strategy for the education sector. During an open forum, the participants cited the lack of knowledge on ICT, inaccessibility of information and unwillingness on the part of some stakeholders to release vital information as some of the challenges plaguing the dissemination of information in the sector. The rest were lack of data collection especially at the grassroots, funding for data collection, storage of vital data and discrepancies in data collected.