Nine final-year students at Accra Girls Senior High School have been deboardinized by school authorities for allegedly keeping phones in their dormitories, Republic Press can confirm.
According to Republic Press source, the parents of the nine female students met with the school’s management to discuss the way forward for the students to continue writing their WASSCE from home.
The nine, all final-year students, were accused of keeping mobile phones in their luggage after an unannounced inspection was conducted by the authorities of the school.
The school’s management expressed concern about the use of unauthorized gadgets while in school.
However, parents who spoke with my Republic Press expressed concern over the decision, citing the current status of the students who are still writing their WASSCE.
The penalty, according to the parents, would have a negative impact on their studies and may result in psychological concerns because the nine children are currently writing their final year exams.
They are, therefore, calling on the Ghana Education Service [GES] to, as a matter of concern, call the headmistress of the school to reconsider the disciplinary committee’s decision to sack nine female students from the boarding house.
Mobile Phone use in second-cycle schools
Heads of second-cycle schools in the country are against the proposal for the use of mobile phones by students.
According to them, mobile phones are a great source of distraction for children.
The Ghana Education Service (GES) policy does not permit students in second-cycle schools to use a mobile phone.
In 2017, the National Secretary of the Conference of Heads of Assisted Secondary Schools (CHASS), Samuel Gyebi Yeboah, said the use of mobile phones will be a problem.
Some of the problems, he said, was the illegal connections of electricity done by students to charge their phones, particularly in the dormitories.
But the issue of whether mobile phones should be used in basic and second-cycle schools in the country still stirs controversy.
The Communications Minister, Ursula Owusu-Ekuful said the Ministry is in talks with the Education Ministry to lift the ban on the use of mobile phones in such schools.
“We are currently having discussions with the Ministry of Education on the opportunities being given to students to use mobile devices but not just to use them for fun in school but to have curricula loaded unto the devices so that they use them as learning aids and not fun tools,” she said.
An educationist and Founder of Gifted and Talented Education (GATE), Anis Haffar, also advocated the use of mobile phones by students, stressing that it was a backward tendency for students to be restricted from using smartphones in a world that was dominated by technology.
He stated that there was an urgent need for holistic structures to be put in place by policymakers in education to allow mobile phones to be efficiently used by students.
Way forward
The Information and communications technology (ICT) curriculum can include the productive use of mobile phones for enhanced teaching and learning but it must address the issue of addiction to mobile devices.
Most schools have no or inadequate computers, and students have phones.
There are tonnes of educational apps and brain games that have enormous benefits for students.
Therefore, Kojo Emmanuel asks: should the government give SHS students the green light to use mobile phones in schools?