Colleges of Education to start paying for Free Wifi

Colleges of Education to start paying for Free Wifi – Education Minister

The Minister for Education, Dr. Yaw Osei Adutwum has indicated that Free Wifi will longer be free for Colleges of Education in the not distant future. The government of Ghana in 2020 installed free Wifi in all public Colleges of Education to help facilitate teaching and learning during the covid-19 pandemic.

However, in his latest statement, the Minister disclosed that has said the teacher training institutions will soon bear the cost for the internet services.

The cost of the Colleges of Education wifi service has overburdened the budget of the Free Senior High School (Free SHS) per Dr. Adutwum in a purported statement to Busy internet, the service provider.

“Upon a review of the contract for the provision of internet services to pre-tertiary schools, we noticed that Colleges of Education were also benefitting from the facility and this is overburdening the funding of free SHS,” he stated.

Currently, the cost of wifi internet service provided by Busy internet is borne by Free SHS. The Colleges of Education that have already benefited from the internet service provider will refund the initial cost of the installation paid back to free SHS.

“Busy will be instructed to start billing the Colleges of Education directly for the usage of the internet service. The original cost GH¢ 6,824,000 paid for the 46 public Colleges will be shared for them to pay,” Dr. Yaw said in the release.

However, the current update on Free Wifi in Free SHS is not working as expected according to the Director-General of the Ghana Education Service (GES), Prof Kwasi Opoku-Amankwa.

Read:GES challenges SHS heads to improve 2021 WASSCE results, shame critics

“The government has installed free Wi-Fi in all the Senior High Schools (SHS) but is not working properly in some schools and also we have to train staff on how they can use it,” he told the Accra-based United Television (UTV).The Director-General of Ghana Tertiary Education Commission (GTEC) has been asked to communicate the decision to the over 40 Teacher Training colleges of Education under the auspices of the Government of Ghana (GoG).