Halt Foreign Masters Scholarships – EduWatch Tells GETFund

Rexbank 6 months ago

Africa Education Watch (Eduwatch) has criticized the Ghana Education Trust Fund (GETFund) for advertising Foreign Masters Scholarships. EduWatch has since urged GETFund to halt the Foreign Masters Scholarships immediately.

They argue that, according to the GETFund Act of 2000 (Act 581), the Fund’s role is to support scholarships for brilliant but needy students to study in Ghana, not to manage foreign scholarships directly.

It could be recalled that in March 2024, Parliament approved a GHC 3.9 billion allocation to GETFund, which did not include funding for scholarships. Thus, any plans by GETFund to spend on Foreign Scholarships in 2024/25 are illegal and fall outside the approved budget.

Ghana aimed to increase its Gross Tertiary Enrolment (GTE) from 16.97% in 2017/18 to 40% by 2030. However, by 2023, the GTE only reached 19.2%, with a 34% transition rate from secondary to tertiary education. This low rate is concerning, especially as more students are passing the WASSCE exams but face financial barriers to accessing higher education.

The Student Loan Scheme, intended to help needy students, is underfunded. About 30% of applicants cannot access loans, and those who do face delays, leading some students to drop out or take low-paying jobs. The average student loan of GHC 2,250 per year is insufficient to cover even the first month’s costs of tertiary education, compared to the GHC 400,000 cost of a one-year foreign Masters Scholarship.

Most foreign Masters programs offered are available locally at a fraction of the cost. Funding these foreign scholarships does not provide value for money, as studying abroad can be 20 times more expensive than studying in Ghana.

Ghana is facing economic challenges, including spending cuts and increased taxes. Using limited educational resources for foreign scholarships is wasteful, especially when many basic schools are in poor condition.

The 2019 GETFund Performance Audit Report found that GETFund improperly administered scholarships instead of funding the Scholarship Secretariat to do so. The Auditor-General recommended that GETFund comply with its legal mandate and stop administering foreign scholarships. This recommendation, upheld since 2020, should continue.

Eduwatch and IFEST acknowledge the transparency and accountability issues within the Scholarships Secretariat but are committed to working with the government to improve the system. They advocate for a single scholarships authority accountable to Parliament and for decentralizing tertiary scholarships to public institutions.

EduWatch Is Therefore Demanding The Following;

The Minister for Education should instruct GETFund to stop the Foreign Scholarship Application process.
Parliament should prevent GETFund from spending on Foreign Scholarships as it is unapproved and wasteful.
Presidential candidates should commit to reforming the public scholarship system to ensure it is fair, efficient, transparent, and sustainable.