Boon for SHS day students as Prez launches fee-free policy

All is set for the take-off of the much anticipated progressively free senior high school (SHS) education policy from the next academic year, as President John Dramani Mahama launched it at Ekumfi Otuam in the Central Region, last week.

He also used the ceremony to inaugurate the first of the Community Day SHSs, named after the late President John Evans Atta Mills, who hailed from Otuam.

The fee-free education policy is starting with day students and for the first term, 320,488 students will be covered. They are made up of 111,212 first-year, 109,731 second year and 99,753 third-year students.

To demonstrate its resolve to successfully kick-start the programme, the government has released GH¢12.2 million to the Ministry of Education to pay for first term fees.

Items covered include examination, library, entertainment, Students Representative Council (SRC) dues, science development, science and mathematics quiz, sports, culture, ICT and co-curricula.

—Daily Graphic, Friday, September 18, 2015.