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The Minister of Education Dr Mathew Opoku Prempeh has called for more effort by stakeholders in the education sector until the nation achieves it's full goal of making the education system in the country gender responsive and socially inclusive to ensure quality education for all.

The Minister made the statement in Accra when he opened a two-day National Teacher Education Gender and Inclusion Summit on the theme: "Towards a gender responsive and socially inclusive education system - strategizing together and ensuring relevance for teacher education".

It was organized by the National Council for Tertiary Education ( NCTE ) with support from the Transforming Teacher Education and Learning ( T-TEL) of the UK government.

Dr Mathew Opoku Prempeh noted that progress has been made over the last few years in ensuring gender responsiveness and social inclusion in teacher education as a result of the combined effort of government , development partners , Colleges of Education (CoEs) and civil society .

The Minister said there has been an increase in tutors using gender - sensitive instructional methods in CoEs from an overall average of 2.2% in 2015 to 68% in 2018. According to the Minister , there has also been an increase in student teachers demonstrating gender - sensitive strategies from 0.5% in 2015 to 19.1% in 2020.

"The government of Ghana under the able leadership of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akuffo- Addo continues to be committed to ensuring that education is enhanced and ensures equality for all," the Minister stated.

He said the commitment of government to the equality agenda is demonstrated in the Education Strategic Plan 2018- 2030 .

Mr Philip Smith Country Head of the Department for International Development ( DFID) of the UK government said the Ghana Beyond Aid goal cannot be achieved without gender equality and social inclusion where majority of the people are able to realise their potentials .

Speaking on behalf of the Principals of Colleges of Education ( PRINCOF ) Dr Phyllis Agyeman Nyarko described the summit as very significant adding that it will make the participants gain more knowledge towards making teaching practice and student trainees more gender sensitive as they prepare to work in the classroom .

Mr Robin Todd Team Lead of Transforming Teacher Education and Learning ( T-TEL ) noted that significant changes are occuring in the behaviour and approaches of beginning teachers since the introduction of the new curricular for the Colleges of Education ( CoEs).

According to Mr Todd a baseline in 2015 revealed that only over 1% of teachers were displaying approaches and behaviour expected of teachers as set out in the National Teachers Standards.

However a survey carried out last year showed an increase from the 1% to over 30% according to Mr Todd.

"A validation team sent to the 36 CoEs last month to assess progress on gender responsiveness revealed that 97% of the objectives and targets were achieved," said Mr Todd.

Ms Anne - Claire Dufay Country Representative of UNICEF expressed the delight of UNICEF for being part of the gender and inclusion summit aimed at strengthening gender responsive and inclusive education in teacher education in the country.

"The best education environment are those that are fair to all students; male or female, first generation learners, people with special needs or from different social, economic or cultural backgrounds," Ms Anne - Claire Dufay said.

She emphasized the need to harness diversity among students to directly impact education performance positively.