Deputy Education Minister, Dr Yaw Osei Adutwum has dispelled rumours suggesting that students entering senior high schools with low grades will pay fees.
He said the rumour which is causing some panic among parents and students, especially in Northern Ghana, is not true and that the free SHS policy is all-encompassing.
“There is no fee paying component based on academic performance. Nobody is paying fees,” he stressed.
The Akufo-Addo-led free SHS policy takes off today in all senior high schools across the country.
The policy was announced some eight years ago by the New Patriotic Party, then led by candidate Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.
About 400,000 students are expected to benefit from the education policy that will exempt them from paying for tuition and other fees.
At the launch of the logo for the policy two weeks ago, the President said apart from free tuition there will be no fees collected for use of the library, computers and utilities.
There will be a free hot meal for day students as well.
However, even before the policy makes any strides, some parents in Upper West are worried that they will be made to pay fees due to low grades of their wards.
Joy News correspondent Rafiq Salam reports that these are also troubled by the removal of the Northern grant.
But Dr Adutwum says there is no such thing, adding that the free SHS policy is not for a selected few but all students.
“That is just propaganda; it is not true. They [students] should just go and check on the portal and find the schools in which they were placed and once you are placed, you are not going to pay anything.”
He advised parents whose wards have not been placed yet to go onto the placement portal and go through the self-placement process and find a school.
“We are not cutting off any student from any part of the country,” he said, adding “if anything, the free SHS is giving more benefits than the Northern grant and we are doing more.”
Source: Myjoyonline.com