THE CHAIRMAN of the Governing Council of the Bolgatanga Polytechnic, Ambassador Donald Adabre has called on President John Dramani Mahama to consider the establishment of a fund solely for polytechnic education in Ghana.

Though there were concerns that polytechnics in Ghana had diverted from their core mandate of training technically-oriented human resources for the country’s development, Ambassador Adabere said it still behoved on administrators to provide the country with the necessary skills, competencies and more importantly attitudes to position them well enough to provide their quota to national development.

He observed that the current national challenges had not spared the polytechnics and their developmental needs. The inability of the polytechnics to meet budgetary targets, coupled with dwindling student numbers in the midst of reduced government funding, he said, had stalled infrastructural development in almost all the polytechnics.

To him, the many challenges confronting polytechnic education could be addressed if a sole fund was established for all the ten polytechnics in the country, stressing that ‘it is only through this that we can realize the full benefits of polytechnic education.”

Speaking at the 4th congregation of the Polytechnic last Saturday at Sumbrungu, near Bolgatanga, Ambassador Adabere also said the policy of the NDC government to convert polytechnics to technical universities was a well-thought out policy as it would open more access to tertiary education and also provide a carrier path for graduates of polytechnics.

Dr. Mba Atinga, Rector of the Polytechnic, said the congregation was a departure from the institute’s norm, where congregations were held once every two years.

According to him, the polytechnic had progressed to organizing annual congregations for its students to derive full benefit from the year of their graduation.

In all, 402 graduates of the 2013 batch were awarded Higher National Diploma (HND) in various areas of endeavor.

Out of the total, 21 graduated from Statistics, 183 from Accounting, 52 from Marketing, 29 from Secretaryship and Management Studies, 2 from Industrial Art, 28 from Hotel Catering and Institutional Management, 16 from Ecological Agriculture, 16 from Agriculture Engineering, 26 from Civil Engineering and 29 from Procurement and Logistics Management. The total number of males was 262 representing 67% and 129 females representing 37%.

Prof. Mahama Duwiejua, Executive Secretary for National Council for Tertiary Education (NCTE), who was the Guest of Honour said research was critical in the mandate of Polytechnics, describing research as the surest way for keeping oneself and “your country academically, socially, economically and politically alive.”

He, therefore, charged lecturers to devote enough time for research work, as the NCTE enjoined Polytechnics to come up with innovative ideas towards setting up the National Research Fund in raising the research output for national development.