MONROVIA: The National Development Party (NDP), has urged the Liberian government to increase investment in education for the growth and development of the country.
NDP secretary General, Jerry Yarkpah, expressed the belief that, the government needs to increase its investment in education and training to improve students’ learning outcomes.
According to the NDP Secretary-General, Liberian government must also raise its education and training spending to a much higher level to catch up with the average student learning achievements of the country’s aspirational peers aside from increased spending.
He added that, “there is a need for more effective and efficient use of available resources.”
“These reforms are being pushed as Liberians are lagging behind compared to its neighbors on education spending, and underperforming in terms of learning competencies,” he noted.
Citing a World Bank study, he said 90 percent of 10-year-old students in the country cannot read and understand a simple text.
“There is no denying that students fail to acquire the competencies they are supposed to learn in school,” the authors said.
“There must be a shift in focus to manage the government’s limited resources and the public’s need for better quality education and training,” the NDP Secretary General said.
He pointed out that, among the immediately double measures the government can implement is to strengthen and expand the Department of Education’s voucher programs and other types of public-private partnerships.
Mr. Yarkpah said the government can also adopt a participatory process for the allocation of education and training subsidies for public and private education, develop a program to motivate teachers and schools to increase the number of students that meet the minimum learning proficiency standards, as well as set up an education and training innovation fund.
“The learning crisis should be a wake-up call for policymakers to abandon the business-as-usual approach and ensure that those who need assistance should have them,” he said.
