Day: March 18, 2024

The 1984 year group of the Wesley Grammar Old Students Association (WESGOSA) has commissioned and handed over a Robotic Centre to the School.

Constructed at a cost of GHC164,511.00, the Centre is expected to enhance teaching and learning, especially for students studying Science related courses.

Handing over the Centre to the School, Mr Benjamin Laryea, President of WESGOSA 84, said the decision to construct a Robotic Centre, a legacy project of the group, was arrived at in consultation with management of the School, who identified the Robotics Centre as a pressing need.

Giving a breakdown of the amount, he said GHC45,798.00 went into the acquisition of equipment, and the remaining amount being the cost of renovating an old shed for the Centre.

He said the project was aimed at giving the students a headstart as far as Robotics education was concerned.

‘The world is moving in the direction of Artificial Intelligence, and it is appropriate that we prepare our students to take up the mantle,’ he said.

Mr L
aryea who called for a proper management of the Centre, said WESGOSA 84 Group would continue to support the alma mater and called on other year groups to extend support to the School.

Commissioning the Centre, Mr Benjamin Amoako, a Global STEM Alliance Certified Educator, and Country Director for Coderina Education Tech Foundation, commended the Group for the gesture, noting that ‘it is a timely project’.

He said Robotics had become an important part of education, and as such, emerging technologies, including Robotics must be imbedded in the education curriculum.

According to him, by 2030, over 50 percent of career fields would be taken over by robots, hence the need to train the current generation in robotics and emerging technologies.

Mr Amoako also admonished the students to treat the Centre as a training and learning environment rather than a playground.

For her part, Mrs Barbara J.T. Thompson, Headmistress of the School said the Robotics Centre would be put to good use.

Source: Ghana News Agency

The Western Nzema Youth League (WNYL), a youth group, has commended the Trinity Yard School at Cape Three Points in the Western Region, for championing youth empowerment over the last decades.

In a statement signed by Dr Patrick Ekye Kwesie, the Leader of the group, and copied to the Ghana News Agency, said the school had offered free basic education and vocational training with a focus on preserving the Ghanaian culture through traditional arts and sustainable agriculture.

The group said the school’s initiatives had been of great benefit to the people Cape Three Points and Nzemaland since its inception in 2007, through grassroots education, taking into consideration issues with climate change, the statement said.

It, therefore, expressed appreciation to the founder of the Trinity Yard School, Mr Rory Jackson, for establishing an institution dedicated to youth empowerment, preserving the Ghanaian culture, and promoting sustainable farming.

‘We are looking at partnering Trinity Yard School to bring on boar
d petroleum related courses which will purely be a grassroots one for wealth creation,’ the group said.

Trinity Yard School is a not-for-profit school established in 2007 with a mission to run programmes meant to uplift the Cape Three Points community by empowering its youth for development.

Source: Ghana News Agency

Mr Tsornam Akpeloo, Chairperson of the Association of Ghana Industries (AGI) Greater Accra branch, says Technical and Vocational Education Training (TVET) is Ghana’s future and appealed to the government not to relate it to the background.

Mr Akpeloo appealed to the government to continue to focus and give it the needed attention to bridge the gap between the high demand for skilled labour and industries.

According to him, although there was a high unemployment rate in the country, some industries also lacked skilled labour and those industries often had to rely on expatriates to fill in the gaps when it came to skilled labour.

Mr Akpeloo said this at the Vocational Training for Females (VTF) Programme Validation and Dissemination Workshop in Accra.

The VTF in January 2024 commissioned an evaluation to assess the impact of VTF work over the year within the framework of skills development, gender inclusiveness, socio- economic empowerment, and livelihood enhancement.

VTF over the past 20 years has been wo
rking with stakeholders to address the bottlenecks in TVET system to uplift its image in Ghana and make it a viable career choice for the youth through the implementation of various interventions on macro, institutional and micro levels.

VTF programme, a non-governmental organisation, initiated by the Presbyterian Church of Ghana as a response to the rising unemployment problem among the youth especially females, conducted research to assess its impact over the past 20 years.

Mr Akpeloo noted that over 70 per cent of what Ghanaians were eating and wearing was because of TVET, however, industries needed skilled labour to meet targets.

He said there was a need for all to be concerned about curriculum development which would meet the demands of industries.

Dr. Mrs Leticia Osafo Addo, Board Chair, VTF Programme, said Ghana had a lot to do in the TVET space to be able to obtain international standards and practices that produced the ‘best skilled workforce to drive the country’s industrialisation agenda’.

Dr
Mrs Addo called for more commitment and funding for TVET to address the myriad problems in the sector.

Additionally, she said it was important that stakeholders continued to educate the public to do away with the negative narratives about TVET.

Dr Adom Baisie Ghartey, the lead Consultant, who presented research findings, said a total of 25,456 had benefitted from VTF from the year 2012.

He said out of the beneficiaries, 15,331 were females and 10,125, males.

He noted that the introduction of free Senior High School had increased enrolment in the TVET Sector.

‘Increasing enrolment in TVET Sector has resulted in large class sizes, with a potential focus on theoretical approach to lesson delivery. This undermines the essence of practical training for the youth.

‘The expected outcome of perpetuating theoretical training within TVET may defeat the purpose of all these reforms and interventions.’

The Consultant who recounted the numerous benefits of TVET, especially in job creation, called for continuous adv
ocacy to heighten awareness and address challenges appropriately.

Source: Ghana News Agency

Nsutaman Catholic Senior High School in the Sekyere Central District has climaxed its golden jubilee activities with a grand durbar of stakeholders to take stock of its 50-year journey.

Established in 1973 by the Nsuta State, the Catholic Church was invited to partner the founders in an effort to instil discipline and moral uprightness in the students.

With an initial intake of 40 students, the school with current student population of over 2,000, has produced prominent personalities contributing to national development in various fields.

The event which was held on the theme, ‘Celebrating Our Past and Igniting Our Future in a Challenging Environment’, was attended by stakeholders such as old students, traditional leaders, past heads of the school, members of the Catholic Church, parents, District and Regional Education Directorates, among others.

To appreciate the invaluable contributions of persons who have played diverse roles in the growth and development of the school over the years, special awards w
ere presented to certain individuals as part of the celebration.

Students who excelled in their academic works also received awards as a way of motivating others to take the studies seriously for such recognition.

Mrs. Victoria Ussher, Headmistress of the school, paid glowing tribute to the founders, the Catholic Church and all her predecessors for their respective roles in shaping the lives of thousands of students and nurturing the school to its current state.

She recounted measures being put in place by management to achieve academic excellence, disclosing that about 93 per cent of students who sat for the 2023 West African Secondary School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) qualified for tertiary education.

As a Catholic school, the Headmistress said not only were they committed to pursuing academic excellence but also moral uprightness, adding that, the school chaplains had been engaging students on the need to uphold the tenets of Christianity.

On infrastructure, Mrs. Ussher mentioned a number of gov
ernment funded projects including a 12-unit classroom block, 2000-seater assembly hall, 400-capacity girls dormitory, an administration block, 460-capacity boys dormitory, science laboratory, six-unit classroom block and a three-unit classroom block.

Touching on challenges confronting the school, she spoke about the dire water situation, which had rendered all water closets in wash rooms white elephants.

‘Our dinning hall is such that academic work is always affected since the students have to attend dinning in batches,’ she said.

Other facilities that the school urgently needs, she said, were sick bay, additional dormitories and staff accommodation to enhance academic work.

Prof. Stephen Owusu Kwankye of the Regional Institute for Population Studies, University of Ghana (UG) who was the Guest of Honour, said education was the cornerstone of every country’s socio-economic development.

He applauded the government of Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo for its bold initiative to implement the Free Senior High Scho
ol Policy, which was creating access for many students who hitherto could not progress from the basic level of education.

‘I am certain that despite the numerous challenges that this policy has faced, the whole nation in the not too distant future will come to appreciate and commend this administration for this laudable policy initiative,’ he noted.

He urged parents to take advantage of the policy to educate their wards, saying that, education was the best legacy they could bequeath their children without any family member taking it away from them when they were dead and gone.

Prof. Kwankye, who is an old student of the school, said the education he received in the school and subsequent ones continued to be his own property which no one could take away from him.

He entreated the students to be guided by the principles of punctuality, truthfulness and hard work in all their endeavours, especially their academic journey if they want to achieve their life aspirations.

Most Rev. Joseph Osei-Bonsu, Bishop of
the Konongo-Mampong Diocese of the Catholic Church, commended all stakeholders whose sacrifices had brought the school this far and urged them to do more to consolidate the gains.

Source: Ghana News Agency

Employees of the Volta River Authority (VRA) under its Employee Volunteer Programme have provided mentorship services to students of the Prampram Senior High School in the Ningo-Prampram District, to effectively guide them through their career paths.

The two-day volunteer programme had some resource persons interacting with students, while others took over the teaching in the classrooms.

Mr Samuel Fletcher, the Community Relations Manager of VRA, said the organisation was committed to education despite its core focus on electricity engineering.

Mr Fletcher said career guidance was important for students, and it complemented the organisations’ efforts in diverse ways.

He said the diverse educational backgrounds of the VRA staff, which went beyond engineering, was an indication that employees could impart their knowledge in various courses and reaffirmed the organisation’s adaptability to educational initiatives.

He expressed satisfaction with the feedback received from the exercise and said the VRA remain
ed committed to its corporate social responsibility.

The VRA had multifaceted programmes spanning from health, education, cultural activities to community engagement, all aimed at supporting diverse communities.

He said the VRA’s community initiatives went alongside infrastructural support such as water and sanitation facilities, construction of educational infrastructure and the provision of teaching and learning materials.

Mr Fletcher said feedback was important in refining VRA’s corporate social responsibility endeavours, emphasising the company’s commitment to continuous improvement and addressing any negative responses to enhance project outcomes.

Mr Peter Gyan, the Principal of the Prampram Senior High School, expressed excitement about VRA’s response to a request from the school for help.

Mr Gyan commended the Authority for the practical teachings delivered by its employees and expressed hope for more of such collaborations.

He said the counselling sessions and practical teachings in the classroo
ms were particularly valuable, and expressed the hope that the VRA would consider collaborating with the school annually for the programme.

He said the school had some pressing infrastructure challenges aside from the bad road leading to the school, which needed some improvement for students to easily access the campus.

Source: Ghana News Agency

Professor Esi Sutherland Addy, an Educationalist, says engagement of teachers in capacity-building courses brings a new perspective to teaching activities in the classroom.

She said these courses encouraged peer review and offered teachers the opportunity to add more insights to existing knowledge.

She said this in an interview with the press on the sidelines of the Lincoln Community School’s collaboration with the Educators Network on the 13th Teaching and Learning Conference in Accra.

The conference was attended by 530 teachers from various private and public schools.

‘One of the things that I admire about these particular efforts that have been made is that somebody needs to care about the teacher’s welfare,’ she said.

The Educationalist said somebody needed to care about teachers, the fact that they need some time out to step outside their normal environment, interact with other teachers, and look at different ways of doing things.

She said these kinds of informal short courses were critical to brin
ging new energy and perspectives into the teacher’s lives.

Prof. Sutherland Addy urged the teachers to incorporate the teaching of Ghanaian cultural heritage, particularly the languages, symbols, and music, into their teaching practices.

She said the incorporation of Ghanaian cultural heritage into teaching and learning activities by

educational institutions would play a major role in promoting the study of Ghanaian culture by the students.

Mrs. Lesley Tait, Head of Lincoln School, said the effectiveness of a teacher had a direct correlation with the environment.

She said when teachers engage in capacity-building courses, it correlates with improved performances by the students.

She urged the teachers to adopt modern teaching and learning activities devoid of root learning and memorization into more effective teaching and learning activities with an emphasis on critical thinking and problem-solving.

Source: Ghana News Agency

The St Augustine’s College in Cape Coast in the Central Region, has appealed for stakeholder support to acquire robust and quality infrastructure crucial for the training of students.

Mr Henry Arthur-Gyan, the Headmaster of the College, who made the appeal at the school’s 94th anniversary and Speech Day, said the institution was old and needed a lot of maintenance and expansion, to deliver quality education.

The introduction of the Free Senior High School policy had put heads of schools under immense pressure to admit students, some with boarding facilities that had not seen any major maintenance or new infrastructure in decades.

St Augustine’s College had not been an exception as records showed a current total students population of 11,249 admitted from 2019 to 2023, all using the same facilities.

‘It is difficult to repair 50-year-old structures and so, please, let us all get on board to help this college get new infrastructure.’

As we reflect on our journey, we recognise the collective efforts that br
ought us to this point. Challenges have strengthened our resolve and with optimism, we look ahead to continuous support as we strive for excellence,’ he added.

The College’s 94th anniversary was held under the theme: ‘Pioneering education on the foundation of quality infrastructure for sustainable future.’

The highly patronised occasion saw the campus soaked in the school’s colours of fine mixture of white and green.

The anniversary was sponsored by the 1999-year group of the College (APSU 99) who delivered a raft of projects to support the school.

They renovated and modernised an abandoned three-storey 18-unit classroom block with the capacity for more than 900 students.

The facility had been fitted with two coding laboratories, a smart classroom, 900 furniture, CCTV cameras, and projectors for every classroom.

They had also installed a 35-kilowatt solar energy system at the 18-unit classroom block and an ICT facility in addition to a borehole, to mitigate water shortage, and undertook a tree planting
exercise to enhance the environment.

Mr Arthur-Gyan thanked all stakeholders for their ‘invaluable’ support and appealed for more.

‘As we remain resolute in our mission to cultivate students with high academic, spiritual, moral and human values, we call on all stakeholders to continue supporting St. Augustine’s administration,’ he said.

The headmaster touted the College’s academic feat despite its challenges, indicating that the 2023 West African Senior Secondary Certificate Examination (WASSCE) results was a testament of their dedication, as they achieved 98.1 per cent pass rate including 30 A1s.

Mr Francis Bullen Gavor, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Rock Africa, a technology company, lamenting the infrastructural deficit in various schools, called on authorities to formalise the collaborative efforts by Parents Associations, old students and mission churches and assign them the necessary roles to play in the delivery of quality education.

He said over the years student population growth and incr
eased access to education had put pressure on existing infrastructure, but successive governments had not been able to keep up with the demand, leaving the responsibility on the shoulders of parents, old students, and other groups to provide such expansion.

‘We cannot allow the current structure to prevail as doing so will only compound the issues,’ he said.

Mr Gavor called for investment in technology and training of all students in Information and Communication Technology, including the creation and use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools.

‘No student should leave the college without a working knowledge of using computers in their work. I know we are on that path, but we need to find a way to accelerate this,’ so that they could favourably compete with others globally, he said.

Mr Alex Bram, the Chief Executive Officer of Hubtel, an old boy, shared his success story to inspire the students, urging them to pursue their goals with endless perseverance as it was the surest way to succeed.

He acknowledge
d that the beginning stage of every endeavour was tough, but entreated students not to succumb to the challenges, citing himself and his company as an example.

He noted that after several failures and challenges, he and his partners had managed to build their company over the last 19 years to become Ghana’s most successful technology company that cuts across the African Continent.

Mr Bram urged the students to keep persevering and embrace failure as an important part of the journey, stressing that success would not come overnight.

Source: Ghana News Agency

The Deks Educational Institute has launched its 50th-Anniversary celebration with a call on the Ministry of Education and the Ghana Education Service, for a system that allows private Senior High Schools (SHS) survive alongside the free-SHS policy.

The year-long celebration is on the theme: ‘Half a century of education success, proud past, and promising future.’

Mrs Sonia Coolidge-Yakung, the Headmistress of Deks, said there were certain factors that the ministry and the GES needed to put in place before the free-SHS policy could be effective and beneficial for all.

She said the government could place some of the students in private schools under the free-SHS to avoid overcrowding in the public schools.

Mrs Coolidge-Yakung said though the Association of Private School Owners had met with the GES to discuss the issues regarding private SHS, they were still hoping and pleading with the authorities to listen to them.

She expressed concern over the dwindling student population in private senior high schools,
especially Deks, due to the implementation of the free-SHS policy, among others.

‘More than 90 per cent of the private SHS have folded up due to the free-SHS policy because most parents would love for their children to have free education, and that has affected our SHS department,’ she said.

Giving a brief history of the school, she said the institution began with a desire and idea shared by the founders to have an institution that would serve all Ghanaians and shape their future to empower and transform a global community of learners.

She said the theme for the celebration was a legacy the institution had built over the past years.

She said the motto of the school, ‘Show the Light,’ had served as a guiding principle over the years and grown from a simple idea to a beacon of knowledge and a brilliant foundation for the institute.

Mrs Yakung said that from a humble beginning, the institute could presently boast of 51 classroom blocks, science and ICT laboratories, e-learning centres, a bookshop, libraries
, a pre-vocational and pre-technical skills workshop, and other facilities that promote effective teaching and learning.

‘We are one of the few private schools in the Tema Metropolis that has adopted the Montessori system of learning, which seeks to develop the child spiritually, intellectually, and socially through methods of play, and we have a variety of clubs and international exchange programmes that complement the classroom work and break the monotony of always sitting in class,’ she said.

She said over the past 50 years, the institution had turned out over 3,500 students from its inception for the common entrance, Basic Education Certificate Examination, and SSC levels who always came out with impressive results.

Mrs Yakung said that 50 years was an incredible legacy of achievement to celebrate and urged parents and guardians to utilise the school’s services to build the future of their children.

Source: Ghana News Agency