The Upper East Regional Minister Mr Mark Owen Woyongo has called on retired teachers in the Kassena Nankana East District to share their rich experiences with the Ghana Education Service to save the falling standards of education in the region.
He said students who performed poorly found it difficult to re -sit examinations knowing quite well that their results would not get them job placement.
Mr Woyongo said retired teachers had a store of knowledge which when shared with the younger generation would be beneficial to them.
He made the call at the week end, in Navrongo, when the Kassena Nankana Retired Teachers Association (KANARETA) inaugurated their association.
He said considering the long life span of man and the fact that many Ghanaians when retired still looked young, a serious thought was being given the retirement age to ensure that people who fell within such age category continued to serve the country.
He said the region was beset with student rioting and indiscipline evident in the disturbances that occurred in five senior high schools when students vandalized school property
including street lights.
He said the region had looked up to government for the provision of amenities because it was less endowed with those resources yet students vandalized them at the least opportunity.
Mr Woyongo challenged the retirees to use such forum to set up consultancies to advice the education sector on the nagging educational problems.
He said an educational endowment fund would be established in the region to take care of brilliant but needy students so that more professionals, especially doctors would be trained to work in the region.
Mr Philip Agamba, Chairman of the retirees association listed the objectives of KANARETA as bringing retired teachers together in unity to remember past glories, to avail themselves to offer their services to the District Assembly,
Ghana Education Service and their communities, to mentor the young teachers and to support one another.
He appealed to the District Assembly to complete a teachers’ resource centre already started to enable them to prepare their teaching and learning materials for the schools.