Dr. Prince Armah, NaCCA Executive Secretary
The National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NaCCA) will soon announce a short code for the general public to detect unapproved textbooks on the market.
The short code system is part of measures to clampdown on ‘unwholesome’ textbooks in the system.
“What we want to do is to avoid a situation where we have unapproved textbooks in the system,” the Executive Secretary of the Council, Dr Prince H. Armah told the media.
He said NaCCA wants to “ensure that we can vouch for the quality and content of textbooks and especially illustrations in the materials.”
“Government will not buy any textbook or supplementary material from anybody if that book or that material has not been approved by NaCCA. There are others who decide to circumvent due process for their own benefit at the expense of national interest.
“We want to ensure we tighten the process. One of the ways is that we have published the list of books that have been approved and those that have not been approved on our website. A lot of people don’t have access to internet so we want to make it more accessible to users and therefore we have decided to develop a short code which will make it easier for anybody to find out whether a book has been approved or not,” Dr. Armah announced.
Dr. Armah stated his outfit has a good rapport with private schools and “discussions have been fruitful so far” when it comes to regulating the influx of textbooks in the system.
Meanwhile, a five-day workshop to develop an Assessment Framework for the new standards-based curriculum has ended. The workshop was led by NaCCA with facilitation by Cambridge Assessment International Education (CAI) and HEART with funding support from UK Aid and government.
Dr Armah stated that the Assessment Framework is an integral part of the broader educational system and curriculum which all primary schools will be implemented from September 2019.
The Assessment Framework will shift the focus away from just preparing learners to pass exams and will instead focus on making learners functional and conscious citizens support Ghana’s national development.
By ensuring that each individual learner’s progression is monitored throughout the academic year, the Framework will also ensure that the education system can systematically track progress.
It also makes it possible to identify areas of strong and weak performance so that all learners receive the support they need to succeed.
The workshop involved representatives from Ghana Education Service (GES), West Africa Examination Council (WAEC), National Teaching Council (NTC) as well as universities in the country.
There were also officials from the Council for Technical and Vocational Education and Training (COTVET), teacher unions and CSOs who will start by analysing the existing assessment framework in use across schools.
