UG students are urging university management to implement the online teaching support fee in the upcoming academic year to enable registration for the second semester.
According to them, payments for the 2023/2024 academic year have already been cleared, only for another fee to be added.
Consequently, they appealed to management to consider transferring the fees to the next academic year, citing difficulties stemming from late communication and economic situations.
“I think it’s not advisable for students to start paying the online teaching fees now because we’d have to inform our parents and earning a pesewa is not easy now too. Therefore, adding this extra cost too whiles they’ve set their mind free of settling all payments is going to be hard. Before any bill or fee is passed, at least the student populace has to be pre-informed because everyone is not the same financially. Therefore, I propose that the fee should be shifted to next semester.”
“Most students are struggling to pay their fees while others have also finished paying. I don’t think the timeline for the introduction of the fee is good. It should be added to the next academic year.”
“People have paid their academic fees in full and now the portal for the registration of second semester courses is opened and now they have imposed online teaching support levy and because of that you can’t register; this is really outrageous. We call on management to look at this again and give clear communication on it. I think it pushed to the next academic year, where all stakeholders are consulted and the right thing is done.”
The overall feeling among the student body is that management should consider postponing the implementation of the online teaching levy to the next academic year, enabling them to register for the second semester of the 2023/2024 academic year.
Previously, Aspiring University of Ghana Student Representative Council (UGSRC ) President, Martin Agbefia had also petitioned the University of Ghana Management to consider repealing the additional online teaching support fee to be paid by students.
His views were in line with that of the general student populace, considering the economic situation and late announcement of the fee hike.
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Story by: Abdul Razak Wahab | univers.ug.edu.gh
