Over 2 million Ghanaian basic school pupils study on bare floor

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Lack of adequate furniture at the primary school is affecting academic work in the school.

Recent data available through the Ministry of Education’s (MoE) Education Management Information System (EMIS) suggests that as of 2021, 50 percent (596,949) KG pupils, 40 percent (1,308,479) primary pupils and 30 percent (425,465) JHS pupils did not have seating and writing places, bringing the total to 2,330,893, representing 40 percent of basic school pupils.

Pupils lie on their bellies to write and others have improvised blocks and stones as seats and the situation at the upper primary level was no different.

Conditions in the classrooms were deplorable as children sat on the cracked cemented floor to take lessons.

The situation according to the management is affecting the quality of teaching and learning in primary schools.

Despite a national desk shortage of 40 percent, the northern regions of Ghana—Savannah, Northern, North-East, Upper West, Upper East, Bono East, and Oti—experienced ratios surpassing the national average.

The Gushegu Municipality, situated in the Northern Region, is severely affected, experiencing a deficit of over sixty percent.

In primary schools, children are forced to share dual desks in groups of four, with many resorting to sitting on the floor or lying on their bellies to participate in lessons. The situation worsens at the Junior High level.

Teachers express frustration, emphasizing that this predicament is hindering academic progress.

Mahama Hafiz, Headteacher of Maazijung M/A primary said “My school has over 768 children from KG to primary six, but our furniture is only 40 in number and even with that some are broken and so, majority of the children sit on the floor.

“The children are not comfortable and so most of them don’t come to school again. Their parents cannot also afford to provide them with the furniture and so we are just managing here.”