AFRICA EDUCATION WATCH (AEW) PROJECT

AFRICA EDUCATION WATCH (AEW) PROJECT THE GHANA REPORT BY GHANA INTEGRITY INITIATIVE (GII) LOCAL CHAPTER OF TRANSPARENCY INTERNATIONAL

ORDER OF PRESENTATION • INTRODUCTION • AIMS OF THE PROGRAMME • DATA COLLECTION METHODS • CHALLENGES • SAMPLE SIZE AND COMPOSITION • DEMOGRAPHIC ANALYSIS

THE AFRICA EDUCATION WATCH PROGRAMME • The ‘Africa Education Watch’ is Transparency International’s contribution towards solving the problems in the education sector in Africa with particular focus on primary education. • It is a three year programme being implemented simultaneously in seven African countries;

INTRODUCTION CONT‘D • Ghana, Morocco, Niger, Uganda, Senegal, Madagascar and Sierra Leone. • The programme is in two phases: • The diagnostic phase or assessment phase, and • The awareness-building and Advocacy phase,

INTRODUCTION CONT‘D • The first phase was supposed to have started in July 2007 but actually took off in 2008; • The second phase will take place at the national and regional levels over a two year period (2009-2010).

FUNDING OF PROJECT • The programme is supported by Hewlett Foundation in Washington Through Transparency International Secretariat in Berlin, Germany.

AIMS OF THE PROGRAMME • To identify evidence of waste, inefficiency and corruption, if any, in primary education financing; • To identify the effectiveness of local accountability mechanisms in the education sector with regards to controlling them;

CONT‘D • To work in coalitions, alliances and partnerships for national educational campaigns to integrate the call for more transparency and accountability into their agendas.

CONT‘D • To work for changes in policy and practice that, ultimately, will lead to more effective use of resources for primary education • To carry out cross-country comparative analysis of national assessments that will inform policy recommendations to donors and international Education For All (EFA) stakeholders.

CONT‘D • To make cross-country comparisons of the different national campaigns for increasing effectiveness of local accountability structures.

DATA COLLECTION METHODS • Data collection adopted two approaches: • Documentary reviews (desk study), including literature on primary education in Ghana, annual budgets, sector reviews and strategic planning documents, and • Interviews (surveys) of key players in primary education in the country.

CONT‘D • Four sets of questionnaires were administered to the four main stakeholders: • Heads of households (parents), • Municipal/District Directors of education, • Chairpersons of Parent/Teacher Associations (PTAs), and • Heads of Schools.

CONT‘D • For the directors of education and school heads, the questionnaires comprised two parts each: narrative and financial data. • Three regions, Greater Accra (coastal), • Ashanti (forest/middle belt), and • Upper East (savanna) • To capture a good geographical spread. • Two local authority jurisdictions from each region.

CONT‘D • The Bolgatanga Municipal and the Kassena/Nankana District Assemblies from the Upper East Region; • Tema Municipal and Dangme West District Assemblies from the Greater Accra Region. • The Obuasi Municipal and the Asante Akim South District Assemblies from the Ashanti Region.

CONT‘D • Sixty public schools were selected using the purposive sampling approach from a list of schools provided by the Ghana Education Service. • The selection took into consideration the urban and rural divide not only for the districts but also for the schools within the districts. • Two schools benefiting from the pilot School Feeding Programme were included in each district.

CONT‘D • Selection and training of Research Assistants in January • Pilot study in AMA and Dangbe East District Assembly areas • The main study finally took place in March, 2008 in all the study areas. • The researchers received utmost cooperation from all the Municipal/District Education offices and the school heads.

CHALLENGES • In some schools, information records were scattered, incomplete or unavailable. • The way records were kept and organized in schools made it difficult to answer some questions especially on the budget data sheet. • Also, some head teachers were either newly appointed or transferred and so could not provide adequate information.

CONT‘D • While the Education offices’ financial records are kept on annual basis school programmes are recorded on termly basis. • Providing information by academic years was, therefore, a problem in some cases as supplies were for calendar years and/or for periods longer than the academic year

CONT‘D • The question on the impact on decentralization was difficult for many respondents because they did not understand the concept. • Some head teachers claimed that the practicality of the decentralization process was yet to be realized. • This was because, among others, teacher transfers and processing of salaries still took place outside the districts.

SAMPLE SIZE AND COMPOSITION • In all, a total of 1146 respondents were interviewed, that is: • Six Directors of Education. • 60 Head teachers, • 60 PTA chairpersons, • 1020 heads of household (parents), • Class register for Primary 4, 5 and 6 of each school was used to select every fourth pupil’s parent invited for interview • However, in some cases, we had to rely on those we could get.

DEMOGRAPHIC ANALYSIS • 45% of the headteachers interviewed were femaleS; • Only 3% of the PTA chairs were females • 64% of the respondents in the households were females. • 45% of the household respondents had not completed primary education.

THANK YOU • THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION

AFRICA EDUCATION WATCH (AEW) PROJECT