ADEA 2025: Our future depends on values school leaders, parents instill in young people – Apaak

Deputy Education Minister, Dr. Clement Abas Apaak, has urged African educators to place moral and cultural values at the core of school leadership and teacher development.

Addressing participants at the 2025 ADEA Triennale side event on School Leadership and Teacher Professional Development, Dr. Apaak warned that education focused solely on academic achievement risks producing individuals disconnected from ethical responsibility.

“As a continent, we must ensure our schools develop not just the mind but also the hand and the heart,” he said. Quoting as one renowned author, Lewis once  “Education without values, as useful as it is, seems rather to make man a clever devil.”

He emphasized that effective school leadership remains the cornerstone of quality education, adding that leadership failures at any level undermine educational reform.

“Without appropriate and effective leadership in our schools, districts, and at the policy level, no investment in educational transformation can achieve the intended goal,” he noted.

Citing former GIMPA Rector Professor Stephen Addai, Dr. Apaak reminded participants that “leadership is the cause; all others are effects.”

He drew an analogy from the fishing industry, saying “the rot of fish starts from the head,” to underscore how poor leadership affects the entire education system.

Dr. Apaak also called for renewed attention to African cultural identity in education, especially amid the growing influence of artificial intelligence.

“As we reimagine school leadership within the era of AI, let us not downplay African values—particularly those linked to Ubuntu that bind us together as one people,” he said.

He urged school leaders to help students internalize moral virtues and cultural pride, describing character as “the pivot around which all other ingredients for the development of human society revolve.”

“Our future depends on the values our schools, in collaboration with parents, instill in young people,” he concluded. “If character is lost, everything is lost.”