The National Teaching Council (NTC) has indicated that, out of the 7,728 prospective teachers who sat again for the Ghana Teacher Licensure Examination (GTLE) last month, 1,277 passed.
The figure represents 16.5 per cent of the candidates who sat again for the examination, introduced to license teaching practitioners.
A pre-release interview with the Registrar of GTLE, Dr Christian Addai-Poku, indicated that all the candidates had sat for the exam at least twice, with some sitting for as many as nine times.
Failure in the licensure exam since it was introduced in 2018, has practically become a recurring decimal
The NTC is mandated by Section 9 of the Education Act, 2008 (Act 778) to improve the professional standing and status of teachers, license and register teachers in Ghana.
The first-ever teacher licensure examination was written in September 2018.
The purpose of the examination is to enable qualified teachers to acquire a professional licence and also attract excellent young graduates from the universities and colleges of education who have the required professional knowledge, skills and attitudes necessary to deliver effectively in schools.
Dr Addai-Poku, who expressed concern about the high failure rate, explained that those affected had one more chance to re-write the exam at the latter part of the year before its format and content changed.
He told the Daily Graphic that those who would fail again would have to go for the revised GTLE, known as the Subject-based GTLE, which would take off later this year.
Education experts have consistently raised the alarm about the falling standard of education in the country.
The implication of this is that the nation has continued to produce school leavers who lack the capacity to contribute to national development in any meaningful way.
In the considered opinion of this newspaper, the outcome is shameful to say the least. They is a correlation between the quality of teachers and the quality of students are eventually leave educational institutions. When garbage is put in, only garbage will come out.
We call on the government to take a critical look at the caliber of students that apply to enter training colleges. It looks like students who fail to gain admission into the various universities end up in training colleges; it has become the last choice, when all others fail.
The implication of what we are witnessing is far-reaching, which is why we call on the government not to spare resource in its effort to get to the root of this problem that poses a real threat to the development of the nation.
