Members of the University community are hereby invited to an Inter-College Lecture being organised by the College of Education as follows:   

Topic: Transforming Local Communities in Ghana: Is dialogue-based education the answer?

Lecturer: Professor Isaac Kofi Biney, School of Continuing and Distance Education (SCDE), College of Education

Date: Thursday, July 4, 2024

Time: 4:30 pm

Venue: Smart Classroom (SCDE)

Chairman: Professor Samuel Nii Ardey Codjoe, Provost, College of Education 

Kindly find below the abstract and profile of the lecturer

ABSTRACT 

This study is framed by Freire’s dialogue-based education on transforming grassroots communities. Grassroots communities in Ghana experienced improvements yesteryears as local leadership groups (LLGs) and community members (CMs) learned via dialogue-based education to foster a strong self-help spirit in implementing community development (CD) projects. Dialogue-based education, however, seems to be waning in grassroots communities in Ghana and can be revitalized for increased CMs participation in CD projects. Critical and dialogical mixed methods research (MMR) that included story-telling and conversational approaches were adopted. Semi-structured interview schedules and key informant interviews were developed and administered to 45 CMs and LLGs who participated in the study. Simple descriptive, thematic, interpretivist, and narrative approaches were adopted in presenting the results. Participants’ voices and experiences on dialogue-based education in transforming communities were garnered. The findings showed that dialogue-based education was not employed as part of CMs participation in CD projects. A lack of accountability and transparency among LLGs, poverty, apathy, and lethargy hindered CMs active participation in CD projects. The study recommends that dialogue-based education can inform policy decision-making in creating learning groups in grassroots communities, in particular, and CMs active participation in CD projects, in general, in transforming local communities in Ghana.

KEYWORDS: Dialogue-based education, local leadership groups, community members, self-help spirit, transforming grassroots communities in Ghana

BRIEF PROFILE OF LECTURER 

Professor Isaac Kofi Biney is an adult education and community development researcher. Isaac is an Associate Professor of Adult Education and Community Development and the Head of UG Learning Centres. He writes in the areas of adult education, community development, entrepreneurship and lifelong learning. He has over 50 articles, book chapters and three books published to his credit. Isaac lectures at the Department of Adult Education and Human Resource Studies, University of Ghana. He is an external examiner to a number of universities worldwide and engages in capacity building of employees of statutory/private organisations in alternative livelihoods programmes (ALP). Isaac writes on young adults’ growth and enterprising mindsets, and how they create enterprises and make grassroots communities, in particular, more sustainable.

                              All are cordially invited.