The National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NACCA) is gearing up for a comprehensive educational review that will exempt newly admitted Senior High School (SHS) students opting for elective science from mandatory Core Mathematics and Integrated Science courses.
Director General of NACCA, Prof. Edward Appiah, emphasized that general science students already delve deeply into mathematics and science through their elective courses. He believed that this revision will significantly enhance the overall education system.
Former secretary of the National Union of Ghana Students (NUGS), Ransford Tege, stressed the importance of revisiting the fundamental reasons for studying Core Mathematics and Integrated Science in the context of general science students.
“Let’s get back into looking into the core values of studying the integrated science and the core mathematics. Let’s read into the analysis of why those courses were composing. Then we look at students who are offering sciences and what the scientists seek to achieve in the coming tomorrow.”
Tege suggested that if the analysis reveals redundancy in content between Core Mathematics and Integrated Science and the elective science subjects, then eliminating the mandatory courses for elective science students could be a positive policy direction.
“So if it is from the angle of duplication that government is trying to come up with such a policy, then I would say that it is a policy in the right direction. But if we go back into our analysis and we realize that the core mathematics seeks to serve or give knowledge, different knowledge, above and what elected mathematics will be, then I think that it will be of good for the country to go as we usually go with our normal method.”
Ransford Tege also proposed the possibility of adapting the elective mathematics syllabus to compensate for any crucial aspects missed by not studying core mathematics.
This move, Tege believes, could streamline the educational process and reduce the burden on students pursuing general science at the senior high school level.
