The Chartered Heads of Assisted Secondary Schools (CHASS) were recognized by President Nana Akufo-Addo for their commitment to the innovative Free Senior High School Policy’s successful implementation, which began in September 2017.
The President also praised them for the pupils’ consistently outstanding results in the West African Senior High School (WASSCE) exams since the Policy’s implementation.
President Akufo-Addo declared in his address to the 61st Conference of Heads of Assisted Secondary Schools (CHASS) on October 11, 2023, that despite the adamant opposition of critics, “there can be no longer be any controversy about the validity of the Free SHS policy and its consequential measures.”
President Akufo-Addo claims that the WASSCE scores of Free SHS graduates have overtaken those from 2016 before he took office.
Although enrollment has increased—it now stands at about 1.4 million pupils, as I mentioned—quality has not suffered. However, after the implementation of the Free SHS policy in September 2017, it has improved, and I would like to take this occasion to express my sincere gratitude to the members of CHASS for the outstanding results witnessed in the West African Senior High School tests.
“The 2022 WASSCE results of the third batch of the ‘Akufo-Addo graduates’ show 60.39% of students recording A1-C6 in English, as opposed to 51.6% in 2016; 62.45% recording A1-C6 in Integrated Science, as opposed to 48.35% in 2016; 61.39% recording A1-C6 in Mathematics, as opposed to 33.12% in 2016; and 71.51% recording A1-C6 in Social Studies, as opposed to 5
President Akufo-Addo reminded the audience that the 2021 class of students, who also achieved extremely respectable achievements, were the forerunners of the double track system, which upon its introduction had drawn a great deal of unjustified derision and baseless criticism.
The outcomes for 2022 have been the best in the previous eight years. There can certainly no longer be any debate over the legality of the Free SHS policy and its ensuing actions, he emphasized.
In response to a question about the justification for the introduction of the Free SHS policy, he said that, at the time he took office in 2017, the nation had a regrettable situation between 2013 and 2016 in which, on average, 100,000 children each year who passed the B.E.C.E. were unable to enroll in senior high schools even though they met the requirements because they could not afford the tuition.
If this condition had prolonged for a decade, when, cumulatively, it would have led to a “unacceptable outcome,” he added,
At the junior high school level, one million kids would have quit school.
He stated as a result that “it would have been too perilous for Ghana’s stability, as we would have been creating an unfavorable future for our youth. It was an unpleasant situation, and my group and I were determined to put an end to it. That is one of the main reasons the Free Senior High School policy was implemented in September 2017, eight months after I took office.
President Akufo-Addo claimed that since the introduction of Free SHS, “access, under the policy, has gone from a population of 830,000 when I took office to 1.4 million today, which means, in effect, we have been able to catch and retain the annual 100,000 dropouts within the educational system. The country and the young people participating can be proud of this development.
President Akufo-Addo assured members of CHASS of “a brighter future for Mother Ghana, where the Ghanaian people will witness a flowering of Ghanaian civilisation, which will ensure that every Ghanaian child, no matter their economic, ethnic, gender, regional, or religious background, will have ready access to quality education and opportunities for professional growth.”
