Zambian delegation to understudy Students Loan Trust Fund operations

A six-member delegation from the Zambian Higher Education Loans and Scholarship Board has visited the Students Loan Trust Fund's (SLTF) headquarters in Accra to acquaint themselves with the operations of the fund.

The delegation, which comprised three members of the board and three members of the management team, is in the country for a four-day tour aimed at understudying how Ghana’s SLTF system operates so they could replicate it in their country.

Since their arrival last Monday, the team has been engaging the management of the SLTF on several areas of their operations, such as the scope of work, financial sustainability models, digital transformation, governance, partnership and stakeholder engagement among other issues.

Call

During a courtesy call on the Minister of Education, Dr Yaw Osei Adutwum, he said the ongoing reforms in Ghana’s education system were aimed at ensuring that they matched the current global standards.

He explained that the various interventions introduced during the past seven years had transformed the education space drastically.

The Education Minister, who is also the Member of Parliament for Bosomtwe, said the reforms going on were to ensure that students acquired 21st-century education in the right environment and not in the 19th-century learning environment.

Dr Adutwum elaborated on the various novel innovations in the education sector in Ghana to the delegation amidst the display of pictures and videos to support his statements.

The Education Minister described the relationship between Ghana and Zambia as very cordial, dating back to decades of good relationship.

He indicated that Ghana was ready to support any country that requested its assistance towards the transformation of its education system since the continent could not remain poor due to a lack of good education.

Prudent operations

For his part, the Chief Executive Officer of SLTF, Nuhu Bayorbo Mahama, said his outfit would continue to maintain its position in the prudent management of the fund to help students have access to the money for their studies.

He assured the delegation of the SLTF's readiness to continue to provide them with the needed support to enable them to “replicate our success story in their country.”

The CEO praised Zambia for choosing Ghana as the country they wanted to learn from and stated that the SLTF would be ready to also visit Zambia when called upon to do so.

Leader

The leader of the Zambian delegation, Geoffrey Samukongo, who is the Chairman of the Higher Education Loans and Scholarship Board, said the visit was to have a valuable insight into the best practices, particularly in areas such as funding mechanisms, recovery strategies and system digitalisation.

He explained that the visit was to help them learn about how the SLTF had been able to manage a large-scale financial aid programme so it could help them replicate it in their country.

He described Ghana’s current education system as a model for the African continent and thanked Dr Adutwum and the government for the vision and efforts towards transforming the nation through education development.