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| Letter From The President: Computerized Confusion |
9/23/2005 |
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Letter From The President: Computerized Confusion
Countrymen and women, loyalists and opponents,
Whiles I was in New York, I heard tales about the so-called computerized selection and placement system that has been adopted by the Education Service of Sikaman, popularly known as GES. This system, as its name implies, is being used to determine how fresh junior secondary leavers are selected and placed in senior secondary school. From what I hear, the system is causing a lot of headache for students, their parents and even some school heads. If it’s any consolation for those affected, I’d like to say that I am also not happy about the new system.
Don’t get me wrong. I am no technophobe. The fact that I don’t have sophisticated Internet skills (I don’t even know how to hold a computer mouse properly) does not mean that I don’t like technology. I love the new information communication technologies and I strongly believe that we can use ICT to develop our country. However, I think the GES and the company it contracted to develop this computerized selection and placement programme have gotten it all wrong.
I have heard some very ridiculous stories about how this computerized system operates. For example, a certain gentleman told a good friend of mine that his daughter who obtained aggregate 12 in the BECE has been placed at Efutu Secondary School. This girl has never heard of Efutu Secondary School and, therefore, she’s never even thought of entering that school. All her three choices were in Takoradi, where the family stays. Out of the blue some computer has decided that the only school available for her is a day school in Efutu – where she doesn’t know anyone. This is giving her parents a lot of sleepless nights because if they decide to send their daughter to Efutu, they would have to arrange for accommodation for their little girl and worry about sending her so far away from the family’s base. The little girl is literally being forced to start life as an adult – staying on her own and fending for herself with no adult supervision. Just think about the possible consequences. The girl’s parents would be content to have their daughter attending some nearby “unknown” school if it would take away the extra cost of forcing their teenage daughter to prematurely start living by herself in an a faraway town.
This is just one example of the confusion wrought by the computerized selection and placement system. It’s very ironic because this system was actually supposed to eliminate the confusion and corruption associated with the placement of students in secondary school. It might have reduced (not eliminated) the corruption to a certain extent. But has it lowered the confusion? Absolutely not! The confusion is at an all time high and I don’t like it.
When these things happen, people tend to blame me for it. You know how people like to blame the president for every misfortune they suffer. When their spouses leave them, they blame me; when the sun shines too much they blame me; if the rains fail to fall they blame me. They even blame me when they are constipated. So I know they are going to start blaming me soon for the computerized confusion at the GES if Mike Nwaso and his clique do not take immediate steps to rectify the damage caused by their ‘system’.
When people started complaining about the computerized system, the GES should immediately have taken a pause to re-examine it. They didn’t. The rather chose to organize press conferences to defend it and proclaim their wisdom in going for it. What is the wisdom in using a system, which creates chaos and discontent? Am not suggesting to the GES to stop using the computerized system – not yet! But I guess the time has come for some sort of human(e) intervention. They should start considering the cases of the thousands of parents who are complaining about what appears to be the ill-thought placement of their pupils in faraway schools – which they didn’t choose anyway. These parents should be allowed to make their own choices as to the schools they wish to have their wards attend. I know that whiles there are vacancies in many schools in Accra, some parents in the city are being asked to send their kids to schools in places like Navrongo and Enchi. Meanwhile, some parents in Enchi and Navrongo are being asked to send their children to schools in Diabene and Kintampo. I also know that some parents are being asked to take their kids to expensive private schools, which most of them cannot afford. To resolve the problem, the GES should simply give the parents a choice of schools nearest to them and allow them decide where they want to place their kids. This is the short-term solution, considering that schools are due to reopen in just about a week. For the long term, I will like the GES and the company, which designed the computerized system to stop touting the supremacy of the programme and soberly reflect on its weaknesses. From the little I know, it’s seems to me that the system works more by random selection than intelligent placement. For example, if a pupil in Sunyani scored aggregate 9 in the Basic Education Certificate Examinations (BECE) but chose three schools which only accept aggregate six she will not get a school of her choice. That’s when the computer comes in and randomly decides that there are vacancies in a certain school in Konongo so the child should go there. Such ad-hoc crap! Instead of defending the indefensible and shifting the blame for the chaos to parents’ misunderstanding of the system, the GES should rather consider its shortcomings and correct them. If the programme needs to be redeveloped, so shall it be. If the programmers need to be changed, so shall it be.
The claim by the GES that the confusion surrounding the system has come about because parents do not understand its workings is silly and absurd. Why is it that parents do not understand the system anyway? It’s because the GES literally forced it on them without any education. The parents woke up one day and they were told that a computer will be deciding where their kids attend school and they are expected to understand that and be happy? If the GES wants to continue using this system, they will be well advised to start educating the public (not just parents) about how it works. If out of incompetence or the sheer lack of ingenuity they fail to make the system work, I will order them to go back to the old system of human selection and placement, which, by the way is laden with extreme corruption but is less confusing. In which case, the practical and least expensive thing to do will be to take steps to eliminate the corruption associated with the human system. And happy we shall all be. The GES cannot use its incompetence to increase discontent in our country and, need I say, reduce my popularity.
Excellently yours,
J. A. Fukuor
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