Child Rights International an advocacy group has condemned the management of Ejisuman Senior High School for deboarding some seven girls over a viral video.
The seven are all final year students. They are accused of using a mobile phone – which is prohibited in basic and high schools – to “intentionally upload a video on social media where unprintable words that border on sex were spewed out.”
They were sacked from the boarding house effective February 6, 2020, pending a final determination of their fate by the school’s Board, a letter to the Ashanti Regional Director of Education said.
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Mr Bright Appiah who is the Executive Director of Child Rights International believes the school authorities erred in their decision to expel the students from the boarding house and what they actually ought to do is counsel these girls.
“What they have done is just a by-product of what goes on in the lives of these girls. They are showcasing a bit of what goes on in their daily lives and it is your responsibility to dig further to know what exactly is making the children behave this way and that is what the authorities need to do. The school environment is the constitutional right of every child and nobody has the right to change it. All you can do is ensure that Children follow regulations, and abide by it. The school erred in their decision and the fact that their names have been published is a disrespect to the girls and GES must immediately take the matter up,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Africa Education Watch has also released a statement on the matter and believe deboardinizing the girls will not solve the issue.
Portions of their statement read: “Punishing girls by sacking them from boarding school only places them in hostels without any parental or school control. Exposing them to harm in society, a positive discipline strategy must reform offending students rather than exposing them to even higher levels of truancy, the GES must take a second look at deboardinization as a form of punishment and adopt progressive sanctions that will reform offending students.”
Although the school’s management is yet to speak after issuing the statement, the Ashanti Regional Student Representative Council Coordinator, Raphael Sarkodie called for intensified guidance and counselling in Senior High Schools.
