I can recall vividly a day when my ICT (Information Communication Technology) lecturer asked "how many of you would like to become teachers after school?" Initially, I thought that was a silly question because everyone in to study if you want to teach in a basic school. So why would we be here in the first place if we do not want to be teachers? I quizzed silently.
One might presume that all the students in the lecture hall were aspiring to be teachers but don't be misled. In a class of over 100 students only less than 10 said they wanted be teachers in future.
So why do people who do not want to be teachers get themselves trained as professional teachers?
That question would be best answered by the students themselves.
As a teacher myself, I have had the privilege to interact with a lot of teachers and 'teachers'.
Teachers here means those who are trained and want to be teachers. Whereas 'teachers' means those who are trained as teachers but do not want to teachers.
Over the years, what has become very clear to me is that 'teachers' have outnumbered teachers in our classrooms. It's a shame really, but that is what happens when no conscious effort is made by the powers that be to takle unemployment head on.
In Ghana, becoming a teacher has become the easiest way to get employed in the public sector irrespective of the educational background of the potential employee in question.
I have met a person with a degree in geology teaching chemistry in a senior high school.
On another occasion, I saw one with a degree in communication studies teaching social studies in another senior high school. Am sure the reason those people found themselves in the classroom is because they could not find employment in their respective fields of study.
More and more high school leavers are now opting for the colleges of education not because they love the teaching profession but they want government employment immediately after school. Most of these students would move on to other high paying professions later.
I would not begrudge any teacher who quits the profession for higher heights but my problem is about their commitment, if your heart is not in the classroom, at what level would your commitment be?
If a teacher knows from day one that he is only using the profession as a steppingstone, how committed would that teacher be in realizing the medium and long term goals of the school he is deployed to.
If the fear of unemployment becomes the only yardstick for choosing to become a major stakeholder in education like a teacher then we are doomed!
It is not really a surprise that teacher absenteeism is on the rise. For teacher punctuality, the least said the better. The passionate teachers who made us who we are today can no longer be found in our classrooms. The very few passionate ones in our classrooms today are helpless because they can't do it all by themselves.
The issue of passion is not exclusive to the teaching profession but to all aspects of public service in my beloved Ghana.
The consistent reports and experience of cruel treatments by health professionals in our hospitals, the money-collecting attitude of the police, the pay this and that before I employ you attitude of HR professionals sums up my story. Passion to work and work right is dead and gone!
It appears most young job seekers today seek salary and not work.
Some have agued that the passion we demand from the country's labour force in general cannot be realized if the powers that be fails to do it's bit to provide public workers with better working conditions.
I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate and urge all the passionate workers not to loose their guard. Let us always remember our passion and hard work may never recognized or rewarded but our joy remains in the fact that the younger generation will emulate our work.
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