Acting President of the Catholic Institute of Business and Technology, Very Rev. Fr. John Louis has called for reforms in
formal education in the country. According to him, poverty would drastically
reduce if amends are made to the curriculum
to focus on entrepreneurial skill development of students.
He has called
on the Church to begin negotiations with government to draw the attention of
industry players to relook at Ghana's
formal education system as far as subject content and methods are concerned. This,
he said is a factor accounting for increase of social vices among the youth in
the country.
"While the Church
is doing well in providing bright future for many of the youth through its many
schools, it needs to start looking at the course contents and teaching methods
employed. These need to be changed and
replaced with those which equip students with entrepreneurial skills, so that
the majority of those who graduate from her schools would have the capacity of
self-employment. The Church needs to
team up with the state to work this out." he said.
He made the
call at a public lecture put together by the Accra Archdiocesan youth council
in collaboration with the provincial youth council on the topic, " the
role of the church and family life in curbing social vices amongst the
youth", in Accra.
Fr. Louis bemoaned the
spate of social vices among the youth. He added that modern ways of sanctioning
such as imprisonment and fines sometimes erode the social controls there are, and
in the process, make the youth prey to social vices.
He further stated that "the
family, the church and the state, have
the responsibility individually and collectively to safeguard and enhance
social controls against the contemporary social changes".
Some of these, he said
include families striving to eliminate
causes of social vices that are within their control. Thus, broken homes, lack of parental care and
supervision and parental negligence among others.
He advised that social
media and the internet be used as a tool to harness potentials rather than
encouraging vices and the sharing of pornographic materials.
"Families should
endeavour to make ICT, esp. the social media, a tool for holistic development.
That is, they should teach their children to harness the merits of ICT while
overcoming its demerits," he said.
He called for the effective socialisation of children at home to enable them imbibe the norms and customs of good behaviour as well as rehabilitate those who need it.
Touching on how the
Church can help prevent social vices among the youth , Fr. Louis
enumerated evangelisation, the
establishment of rehab centres, and impressing upon state institutions to
enforce appropriate formal social controls among others as what the Church can
do to prevent social vices among the youth.
He however added that
though families, the Church and other
institutions have roles to play in curbing social vices among the youth, young
people have their part to play and should seek social virtues and be determined
to achieve them.
The Lecture was
attended by secretary to the Archbishop of Accra, Rev. Fr. Anthony Adu-Mensah,
Prof Kojo Sena of the University of Ghana, Assistant Archdiocesan youth
chaplain, Rev. Fr. Osborn Kudolo, Priests and religious as well as hundreds of
youth from the Catholic Archdiocese of Accra.
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