Chapter 7: The Quality Dilemma: An Ethnographic Study of Rural Education in Northern Ghana

Over the past 15 years, Ghana has experienced several changes in its educational landscape due to the educational reforms of the late 1980s and early 1990s. In 1987 the government of Ghana embarked on an educational reform program reducing the number of years of schooling from 17 to 12 years.⁰⁰¹ Its aim was to enhance educational access and improve quality while ensuring cost effectiveness across the system—a tall order

for a country whose system had lost its previous glory (Sutherland-Addy, 1997). The government of Ghana has made a concerted effort over the last 10 years to ensure that basic infrastructure is provided at the primary level and that universal basic education is achieved for all children in Ghana. Several multilateral and bilateral programs have helped to increase the numbers of schools from 8,022 to 11,142 between 1981-1982 and 1991-1992 (United Nations Development Program, 1997). The Ghana Living Standard Survey (GLSS) reveals that the net primary enrollment rate over the period 1987-1988 and 1991-1992 increased nationally from 62% to 74% respectively (Ghana Statistical Service, GSS, 2000a). This trend occurred in all areas of Ghana except the Northern Region where enrollment declined between 1990 and 2000 due to socio-cultural and socioeconomic factors which prevent a high proportion of children, particularly girls, from accessing the basic education system (,Casely-Hayford & Wilson, 2001, 2002). Despite some gains in enrollment across the country, the issues of poor educational quality are becoming recognized as the main barrier to achieving universal primary education particularly for rural children in Ghana and other parts of Africa (Casely-Hayford, 2003; Colclough, Rose, & Tembon, 1998).