Chief of Staff urges youth to take advantage of Free SHS to advance themselves for higher level jobs

The Chief of Staff at the Presidency, Akosua Frema Osei-Opare, has encouraged the youth to take advantage of the running free Senior High School education policy to prepare and be qualified for higher level jobs.

According to her, women and girls play the majority of roles in the homes but are not given the opportunities they deserve outside that sphere, especially in the formal sector of the economy. Hence are living on no “steady income and low social security”.

“They [women] are less likely to be employed in the formal sector and where they are employed, they tend to earn lower wages,” Madam Frema Opare added.

She made the observation at the 2022 International Women’s Day observed at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) auditorium under the theme “Break the Bias”.

Her comment stems from the ages-long biases exhibited towards women and girls, where they are confined to performing domestic functions in the home while their men counterpart go out in search for money to send home.

This has been observed over the period to have negatively affected young girls and women in education, for which reason the United Nation pushes for gender equality even in education.

According to United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) report dubbed “Global Education Monitoring Report (2020)”, the number of girls who have enrolled in primary and secondary school has risen by 180 million since 1995.

“Globally, equal numbers of girls and boys were enrolled in primary and secondary education in 2018, whereas in 1995 around 90 girls were enrolled for every 100 boys.

“Between 1995 and 2018, the percentage of countries with gender parity in education rose from 56% to 65% in primary, from 45% to 51% in lower secondary and from 13% to 24% in upper secondary education,” the 2020 report added.

This data provided by UNESCO, Madam Frema Opare has alluded to, noting that the education polices introduced by the Akufo-Addo led government has contributed to the high enrolment figures seen in the SHSs.

“The free Senior High School policy as introduced by the President of the Republic, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, among others have enhanced equality in education opportunities which relates with the SDGs [Sustainable Development Goals] that seek to promote gender equality and empowerment of women…” said the Chief of Staff.

She therefore advised that the youth should condition themselves for the opportunities out there by taking advantage of the Free SHS and TVET education implemented by the government.

“It is time that the younger generation rise up, taking advantage of the favorable education policy and other programmes of the Akufo-Addo Government to advance themselves for higher level jobs” she stated.