Ghana’s public broadcaster to launch ‘university’

The Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC) plans to transform its existing engineering, radio and television training schools into a dedicated tertiary institution.

The Director-General of GBC, Albert Don Chebe, made the announcement at a graduation ceremony for the latest cohort of students on the station’s broadcasting techniques course. Sixty-eight participants – 25 women and 43 men – undertook an eight-week training course in general broadcasting and production skills.

Chebe said GBC would collaborate with an external partner to launch the institution by September 2014, with accreditation from one of the established universities in the Ghana. He said the training school had been offering the programmes for a long time and therefore “we are going to reorganise these programmes to ensure that they are accredited so we can give out diplomas and certificates that will enable those, who have gone through this programme, to present them outside the walls of GBC.”

He added that the migration to digital terrestrial television would “revamp our processes, transform our institutions and reform our programmes.”

Joyce Anim-Ayeko, head of the training school, said that participants had the chance to handle state-of-the-art broadcast equipment and work with some of the best in the industry.

“They are taught to be bold and ambitious and learn all they can at the feet of the experts before launching themselves. For this reason, all participants are required to do practical attachment in any of GBC’s stations nationwide,” she said.