The Ghana National Education Campaign Coalition has called on the Ministry of Education, Science and Sports {MOESS} to "establish a rural education infrastructure fund to speed up the development of teacher housing and school infrastructure in rural areas."

In addition, "Government should formulate and enact a policy to train all Community Education Teaching Assistants employed under the National Youth Employment Program (NYEP) before deployment into basic schools," the coalition said.

GNECC's call was contained in a resolution presented to Prof Dominic Fobih, Minister, MOESS through his secretary last Friday at the end of the 2008 Global Action Week (GAW), a world wide campaign platform for promoting the Education For All (EFA) goals.

The presentation of the resolution passed almost unnoticed at the ministry as Prof Fobih declined to receive it directly from members of the coalition who were led by Mr Bright K. Appiah, Chairman of GNECC.

The minister indicated that he would not be able to attend to the team because he was on his way to the Castle, Osu. However, he was seen pacing up and down in the corridors for the period - about an hour - that members of the coalition were waiting in his office.

His deputy, Mrs. Angelina Baiden-Amissah whom he had earlier supposedly delegated to attend to the coalition was also not in the office.

The coalition, therefore, had no option than to leave the resolution with the secretary for onward transfer to Prof Fobih. Members were informed he would look at the document.

GNECC as usual hosted this years GAW simultaneously with other campaigners in over fifty countries. Locally, the week was observed under the theme: "Quality Education to end Exclusion."

During the weeklong programme, GNECC made public the findings of a research project on "The Impact of Rural-Urban Divide on Quality Basic Education in Ghana" which was conducted by Mr Gideon Hosu-Porbley, a Development Researcher.

Among the topical issues that came up were the high pupil-teacher ratios in rural schools, the lack of teaching and learning materials, uneven distribution of qualified teachers, etc.

The resolution, therefore, was to highlight the need to take measures to address these issues and many others not contained in the report but which are equally pertinent.

In terms of infrastructure, the resolution urged the MEOSS to set illumination, ventilation and safety standards for the construction of all basic schools.

"In order to increase the number of trained teachers in the education system the MOESS should as a matter of urgency remove quotas on the admission to Teacher Training Colleges."

And "Ministries, Department and Agencies {MDAs} should strengthen their collaboration with District Assemblies to enforce policies binding sponsored teachers to serve their districts upon completion of training."

Also, "Government should intensify efforts to address gender parity in basic education."

Further, GNECC through the resolution said government should adequately resource and strengthen the inspectorate division of the MEOSS to ensure that monitoring and evaluation practices are implemented on a regular basis at the local level.

It was not lost on GNECC that there was the "need for urgent intervention to address the widening disparity between basic schools in the rural areas and basic schools in the urban areas."

The basis was the fact that Pupil Teacher Ratio's in rural schools average 1:56 where as that of urban schools average 1:38.

Apart from that, rural school infrastructure remains in a deplorable state compared to urban school infrastructure.

Still, less than 50% of rural basic school teachers are trained where as about 90% of urban basic school teachers are trained.

Altogether, there is a widening gap in performance between rural and urban schools. For instance, in the 2006 BECE results, there was average pass rate of 43% in rural schools compared to 70% in urban schools.

GNECC, therefore expressed hope that Government appreciating the role of civil society in education development, would critically consider the resolution as a means of advancing the attainment of the EFA goals and creating a more just democratic and prosperous society.

In the mean time, GNECC has commended government for introducing the capitation grant, the school feeding program and the inclusion of kindergarten into the basic education mainstream as part of the Educational Reform program and other interventions to improve quality and access to basic education.