Repeated Law students boycott ‘special classes’

Students of the Ghana School of Law, who failed their examinations, have served notice of their inability to attend ‘Special Classes’ prepared for repeated students.

Out of 525 students who sat for the Law exams, only 64 passed in all the papers. Two hundred and eighty-four students were asked to repeat and rewrite all the 10 courses of programmes they registered, while 177 others who were referred in various papers will have to resit those papers.

The students have petitioned Parliament to set up a committee of enquiry to investigate the recent high rate of failure among students of the school. They also want the committee to consider their claim that some of the questions set in examinations were outside the syllabus assigned to them by the authorities of the school. The students complained about LI 2355, particularly the section that states that a student will be repeated if he or she fails in three out of 10 papers.

In a letter addressed to the director of the Ghana School of Law, the students said: “We are deeply concerned about the conduct and management of our examinations which we believe is partly responsible for the high rate of failure.”

“We are equally concerned about the repeat policy which we think is unfair resulting in a large number of students who are struggling to graduate from the school. This unfairness also finds expression in the new reforms that have reversed to the old system of repeating students who fail more than 2 out of 6 subjects in part one and more than 2 out of 4 subjects in part 2. If this policy were to apply fairly then only students who fail more than 6 out of 10 courses should be repeated,” the letter signed by the SRC president Emmanuel Kwabena Owusu Amoah said.

Below is the full letter

BOYCOTT OF SPECIAL CLASSES

We have taken note of the Notice of Special Classes for repeat students. We wish to state without equivocation that we do not think that the challenges facing students of the Ghana School of Law border on teaching and learning.

We are deeply concerned about the conduct and management of our examinations which we believe is partly responsible for the high rate of failure.

We are equally concerned about the repeat policy which we think is unfair resulting in a large number of students who are struggling to graduate from the school.

This unfairness also finds expression in the new reforms that have reversed to the old system of repeating students who fail more than 2 out of 6 subjects in part one and more than 2 out of 4 subjects in part 2. If this policy were to apply fairly then only students who fail more than 6 out of 10 courses should be repeated.

Besides, the capacity of the classrooms for the special classes is far less than the over 450 students that are required to take the classes.

Based on the above reasons, we wish to put on record that our petition on the above grievances are before the General Legal Council, Parliament, the Council of State and the President.

We do not intend to indulge in any act that will be prejudicial to our efforts to seek redress to our grievances.

We wish to respectfully submit that we have resolved not to participate in the Special Classes pending the determination of the issues in our petition. Sincerely,

EMMANUEL KWABENA OWUSU AMOAH PRESIDENT