ActionAid trains 2,000 out of school children

By Seidu
Zakaria, GNA
    

Gushegu (N/R), Aug 6, GNA – ActionAid Ghana
has trained a total of 2,000 out-of-school children in the Gushegu District in
the Northern Region and prepared them to be enrolled in the formal school
system.

The children were trained under the ActionAid’s
Complementary Basic Education (CBE) programme, which aimed at identifying and
training out of school children in deprived communities to be enrolled in the
formal school sector.

The CBE programme afforded these out-of-school
children, who were beyond school going age (eight to 14), the opportunity to
acquire basic literacy and numeracy skills within a period of nine months in
their mother-tongues to facilitate their enrolment into the formal school
system.

The Ghana Institute of Linguistics Literacy
and Bible Translation (BILLBT) in collaboration with the Ghana Education
Service (GES, implemented the CBE programme as part of its mandate to develop
local languages.

The beneficiary children comprised 911 males
and 1,086 females with 80 classrooms used to run the programme throughout the
nine month period in 35 Dagbani and 45 Likpukpan languages within the Gushegu
District.

Mr Abdul Razak, a representative of the
Gushiegu Municipal Chief Executive (MCE) who performed the opening ceremony,
said it was the responsibility of the Municipal Assembly to provide
infrastructure and other amenities for improved quality education in schools.

The commended the ActionAid Ghana for the
initiatives to fund education in the District and assured that the Municipality
would continue to work closely with development for improved education.

He warned parents against the practice of
engaging the children in the farms all day to the disadvantage of learning,
which was impeding their progress.

Mr Razak said a great future lay before them
as children and advised them to continue to learn in order to enjoy the fruits
of their labour.

Mr Iddi Modow, an Assistant Director in-charge
of Human Resource, Ghana Education Service, stressed the need for continuous
sensitization in the communities to tackle the issue of stigmatization and
attitudes of parents towards the education of their children.

Mr Modow mentioned some of the roles GES
played in the implementation of the programme as animation of communities for
CBE learners and the training of facilitators and training of school management
committees and local committee members on their roles and responsibilities.

Others included the orientation of head
teachers and teachers on the programme, supervision of classes and assessment
of learners for placement at the appropriate levels in formal schools.

On the positive impacts of the programme, he
said the enrolment had increased tremendously as many children who were not in
school had now been enrolled and that more schools were opened in communities
that were not accessible to the pupils.

He said intermittent training sessions were
also organized to build the capacity of facilitators on the use of CBE
methodologies and local committees while SMCs were also formed to manage the
classes, since CBE classes were owned by the community members.

Madam Mumuni Alia, Action Aid Ghana Programme
Officer, thanked the Municipal Assembly, GES, chiefs, project communities, and
other stakeholders for the support throughout the programme.

She said within the first cycle the programme
operated in 97 farming communities and enrolled 3,050 out of school children
and that out of the figure, 1,585 were females and 1,465 being males and
created 122 CBE classes.

She called on the Ghana Education Service and
the Municipal Assembly to continue with the programme in order to reduce out of
school children situation in the Municipality.

Madam Alia said as a result the GES had
established four schools in four farming communities to absorb learners around
the area.

GNA

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