Shirking of parental responsibilities or parental neglect is the underlying factor for the high rate of school dropouts and teenage pregnancies in Ghana.
Hawkers, who are of age, move along the streets selling different types of goods, depriving them of a dependable future.
The children of these hawkers who also end up selling on the streets are doing a great disservice to themselves by not attending school and instead, spending their precious time in the street.
One will agree with me that these hawkers and their children hardly make ends meet and also live under deplorable conditions making them unable to make any effective plan for the future.
To them, education has no value and they, therefore, do not cherish it as they tend to be content with the little monies they make daily from selling in the streets.
Parents who are to compel their children to go to school or explain the importance of education to them have woefully failed, which implies that their children will practice whatever their parents do for a living.
Parents should know that education is the pivot around which the development and growth of the country largely depend, and also know that education will open many wonderful opportunities to them in the future.
Those who know the value of education will ensure that they educate their children by looking at the examples of people who were raised in some of the remotest parts of the country and yet took their education very seriously and have become responsible and respected people in society today.
It is interesting to note that very low-income earners like watchmen, hunters, peasant farmers, masons among others, ensure that their children receive the best of education, even though they themselves did not get the opportunity to attend school.
This means these people defied the shame and humiliation which surrounded them and took the appropriate action by educating their children.
Mr Kofi Annan, Western Regional Coordinator for Counselling and Guidance Unit at the Ghana Education Service (GES) who added his voice to the situation said that child upbringing should be seen as a collective responsibility by all and sundry.
He noted that if children go wayward and become a nuisance to society, it affects all and not only becomes a burden on the parents.
He, therefore, called on the schools, society, parents, churches and mosques to play their part in helping children to develop their socialization and emotional state.
Mr Annan also implored parents to provide their children with clothing and food and rebuke them when they go wrong so as to guide and guard them against any social vices that might bring problems to the family and society at large.
