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Prospective Teacher Trainees To Write Entrance Examination Before Given College Admission
Dr.Christian Addai, the Registrar of the National Teaching Council says that prospective teacher trainees wishing to pursue teacher education in any of the accredited public colleges of education in the country will be made to write an entrance examination before being given admission.
In an interview with Joynews, Dr.Christian Addai said, the entrance examination will be used as an entry assessment for the trainee teachers, and after completion, the students will be made to write a level and subject-based licensure examination to be qualified as professional teachers.
“The reforms were to ensure that students who applied to be trained as teachers had the required qualifications and disposition to become teachers”
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The Entrance Examination to be written is called Ghana Basic Education Skills Examination Test (GBEST) which seeks to evaluate prospective teacher trainees in literacy and numeracy.
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Dr. Addai-Poku said the council had held seven successful examinations since its inception in 2018.
Over 123,000 newly trained teachers had sat for the examination in the following subject areas; Literacy, Numeracy, and Professional skills.
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Out of this number, he said over 88,000 teachers passed, with 84 candidates who wrote it five times without success.
“Three hundred and seventy-two candidates have written it four (4) times but they are yet to pass. The mode of training of these candidates cuts across regular, online, and distance programs.
“How these candidates were able to pass through the teacher education program successfully and yet are unable to pass basic skills in numeracy, literacy and essential professional skills remain unanswered,” he said.
The reforms, he said, were, therefore, to ensure that there was a uniform admission criterion for all teacher education institutions in the country, adding that those who pursued an education in other institutions such as the traditional universities would be made to write the GBEST before being allowed to do their Post-Graduate in Education course.
Aside from weeding out people not fit to teach from the system, he said the new reform would also help parents and students not waste time and resources training for a profession they were not fit for.
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