The Conference of Heads of Private Secondary Schools (CHOPSS) has called on the government to expand the inclusion of private secondary schools in the Free Senior High School (SHS) programme.
According to the association, several private schools across the country have available facilities that could be used to accommodate more students and help ease pressure on public SHSs.
In July 2025, the government expanded the Free SHS policy to include an initial 60 approved private secondary schools across all 16 regions under a pilot integration programme.
The initiative was introduced to reduce overcrowding in public SHSs and enable more students to access quality secondary education regardless of whether they attend public or private institutions.
Speaking on TV3’s Daily Brief on Monday, August 31, CHOPSS Head of Communications Kyei Baffour said the initiative had already benefited participating private schools by putting previously underutilised facilities to use.
“It has been helpful. At least, we have made fruitful use of the facilities of these private schools which were left unused,” he said.
Mr Baffour, however, noted that several other private schools still have vacant spaces and infrastructure that could be leveraged to accommodate additional students.
“We still have more private schools still on standby, ready to absorb the rest of the students,” he added.
He argued that expanding the partnership with private schools could help the government address capacity challenges in the secondary education sector without immediately committing substantial resources to constructing new infrastructure.
Mr Baffour therefore appealed to the government to broaden its collaboration with private secondary schools and make greater use of existing facilities.
“We still call on government that since these facilities exist, we can leverage on these facilities and absorb them,” he said.
By:Rachael Djabakie