A Professor of Religious and Moral Education at the University of Cape Coast (UCC), Rev. Prof. Seth Asare-Danso, is calling on government through the Ghana Education Service (GES) to make the study of Religious and Moral Education (RME) a core subject from the pre-school to secondary levels.

He described as baseless the argument advanced by a section of the public that RME had not been able to eradicate moral decadence in society and thus, its study was irrelevant at the pre-tertiary level.

Prof. Asare-Danso noted that the school was one of the agents of socialization and questioned why some members of the public were of the belief that only the school was duty-bound to enforce morality.

Making the remarks at his inaugural lecture, Prof. Asare-Danso emphasized that it was the collective responsibility of social organisations to help shape the moral fabric of the Ghanaian society.

The inaugural lecture was on the theme: “Fulfilling the Mission of the Basel Mission for Sustainable Development: the Presbyterian Praxis.”

“The School is just one of the agents. It must start from the home, the family, the church, the mosque…social organisations have collective responsibility. We need to work very hard to ensure that we will all be able to contribute towards nation building by building a moral community. Let us start from our home,” he said.

VC-UCC, Prof. Boampong, congratulating Rev. Prof Asare-Danso. Looking on is Prof. Philip Ebow Bondzie- Simpson

 During the 1960s, 90s, and around 2007, he recalled with sadness that successive governments spared no efforts to remove RME from the curriculum and later reintroduced the subject following public outcry.

He maintained that: “In fact, we cannot throw RME from our educational system.”

Unlike UCC, Prof. Asare-Danso took a swipe at some public universities for developing half-baked religious courses for colleges of education, advising them to include Anthropology of Religion and Philosophy of Religion in the development of their religious courses to enable them produce all-round religious graduates.

“UCC will continue to provide leadership for this country as far as teacher education is concerned,” he noted, praising UCC for developing first-class religious courses for colleges of education affiliated to it.

Prof. Asare-Danso also lauded government for including Technical, Vocational Education and Training (TVET) Schools in the free senior high school education system.

He, however, identified negative mindset of the public, especially parents, towards TVET as a key challenge militating against technical and vocational education, insisting that TVET was not for academically weak students and urged government to step up education to disabuse the minds of parents from the negative perception.

Rev. Prof. Asare-Danso being robed by Prof. Philip Ebow Bondzie into the College of Professors. With the microphone is former VC, Prof. D. D. Kuupole

Prof. Asare-Danso used the occasion to walk the audience through a laundry list of pro-poor initiatives rolled-out by the Presbyterian Church, including health facilities, education, sanitation, trade, agriculture among others.

With regard to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) he maintained that the Presbyterian Church of Ghana (PSG) had achieved all the seventeen (17) goals judging by the community development schemes it had initiated to promote sustainable national development.

“So if you try to match what the PSG has done against the UN SDG whether there is any goal that seems not to have been captured, I couldn’t get one. They have fulfilled all the goals to the Glory of God” Prof. Asare Danso said.

The event attracted a number of distinguished personalities, including the Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Johnson Nyarko Boampong, who chaired the inaugural lecture.

Also present was the Registrar, Mr. Jeff Teye Onyame, as well as staff and students.

Source: Documentation and Information Section-UCC