Photo: Graphic Online A Ghanaian government official used a Catholic girls’ school celebration to emphasise the need to educate girls as well as boys.
“The education of boys has always taken precedence over that of girls, and we normally use social and cultural misconceptions to discriminate against girls in terms of educational access,” Benedicta Tenni Seidu, director of girls’ education at the Ghana Education Service, told the audience at a public reception to end the decade anniversary of St Catherine School.
Even though the situation has improved and “more parents are now educating their girls, there still exist some levels of prejudice against the education of girls” in parts of Ghana and in developing countries, said Seidu, a Catholic. Although slightly more than half of Ghana is female, in 2017, female enrolment in colleges and universities was 13.53%, compared to 18.68% for males.