Vigorous teaching and learning at the C.K Tedam University of Technology and Applied Sciences has stopped following the strike by the University Teachers Association of Ghana (UTAG).
Asaase News’ Upper East Regional Correspondent Senyalah Castro reports that students have been abandoned as lecturers join the association in pursuit of better working conditions from the government.
Senyalah reported that while a few lecture halls were opened in which some teaching assistants engaged some of the students in studies, many of the lecture halls were under lock and key in a generally quiet and empty campus.
Many of the students, Asaase News has learnt, have either returned home or were yet to report to school due to the strike by UTAG.
All other non-teaching staff of the school were, however, at their various workplaces within the campus.
Godfred Kansake, a postgraduate student, expressed worry a prolongation of the strike would impact negatively his studies.
He said it was also going to affect his finances as he was likely to spend beyond what he had budgeted for the academic year.
Kansake said it was three weeks into reopening but the lecture halls have been abandoned by the lecturers. Supervisors, he stated further, were also not availing themselves to assist the students.
He pleaded with the government to engage the UTAG and find an amicable solution to the impasse so students would be saved from the possible closure of the university.
“Government should try and engage UTAG and then the teachers too must also be ready to compromise at the negotiation table so that they both do not hold entrenched positions. They should do this all in the interest of the students because if this strike is not called off, it would have consequences on students.”
A first-year software engineering technology student, Moro Mohammed Malik, also added that the absence of teachers in the lecture halls posed a challenge to their deeper understanding of their subjects.
He stated that for their course, it was only the teaching assistants who have devoted their time to help them out with their lessons. He said the rest of the teaching staff have abandoned academic activities.
Moro also appealed to the lecturers to return to the lecture halls for the students’ sake.
For his part, Fuachie Emmanuel urged the student representative council to use peaceful actions other than demonstrations to get the teachers back into the classrooms.
He said a demonstration by students as a way of forcing the teachers to call off the strike, could likely inflame the anger of the teachers.
Fuachie’s comments come on the back of reports of a likely nationwide demonstration by the student representative council.
Senyalah Castro
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