Ghana Education News: Headmaster Interdicted for Caning by the GES. This was made public via the Facebook page of the GES.
The Ghana Education Service (GES) as stated that Mr. Francis Donkor, Headmaster of Jachie Pramso SHS has been interdicted effective 7th September 2021 pending investigations into the alleged caning of a student.
He has been directed to hand over the Administration and Management of the school to the Ashanti Regional Director of Education.
Headmaster Interdicted for Caning and The Law on Canning in Schools
On 7th September 2021, news broke that the headmaster had lashed a 19-year-old female student at Jackie Pramso Senior High School (SHS) in Bosomtwe District, Ashanti Region, for aiding a colleague.
The act has left the student not only traumatized but physically hurt with several swellings visible on her back per pictures that went viral after the incedent.
The GES has on several occasions cautioned teachers and heads of schools at the pre-tertiary level to stop using the cane for correcting students.
The Ghana Education Service (GES) in 2017 officially banned all forms of corporal punishment of children in schools in Ghana. The GES had opted for the Positive Discipline Toolkit containing positive and constructive alternatives to correcting children was developed in 2016 as a component of the Safe Schools Resource Pack.
The Director of Guidance and Counselling Unit of the GES, Ivy Kumi on Citi TV’s “The Point of View” urged parents to take on teachers who cane their children as same amounts to an assault on the children.
Read:GES doesn’t respect teachers: GNAT, NAGRAT, and CCT-GH have joined them -Innovative Teachers Claim
Act 29 stipulates that force or damage may be justified if it is necessary to correct a child, servant, or other such people for misbehaviour, as provided in section 31(i) of the Criminal Offences Act 1960 (Act 29). In Ghana, physical punishments such as caning, kneeling down, and slapping has been used to correct or discipline children for decades.
While corporal punishment inflicts physical pain on children, it also has a major mental impact. When schoolchildren are punished in such a way as to leave bodily or mental scars (trauma or fear or shyness for example), they are more likely to engage in violent behaviour.