To complement Government’s efforts at improving access to quality education for all, CARE International in Ghana with support from General Mills Foundation, had constructed four school projects for four communities in the Asikuma-Odoben-Brakwa (AOB) District of the Central Region.
The projects are a two-classroom KG block each for Wansabiampa, Kokoado and Abuakuwa D/A schools with the latter benefitting from a library facility stuffed with books and a four-unit classroom block for the Abehenase D/A Primary School which formerly had no primary school.
All the classrooms furnished with dual desks and teachers’ tables and chairs also have toilets, offices and stores. The projects completed within three years, have been lauded by the chiefs and people of the Area considering the deteriorating nature of school buildings as well as the lack of some basic educational infrastructure in the Area.
Hitherto, children from Abehenase had to trek two kilometers to Asikuma to access primary education and this discouraged many parents from sending their young children to travel that long distance to school thereby delaying their enrolment until they were 11 years. The District, earlier this year experienced one of the most tragic occurrences in the history of the country when a dilapidated Kindergarten (KG) school building collapsed and killed six KG pupils at Breman Gyamera.
The incident still fresh on the memories of Ghanaians, generated a lot of sympathies and debates across the country with the public calling for the audit of all old school projects to have them replaced by new ones.
However, the story has not changed as the GNA observed that many buildings in the District had deteriorated and it continuous usage could have dire consequences for both the children and their teachers.
The beneficiary communities were therefore full of praise for the CARE International-General Mills Partnership for providing them with the new buildings, which they said had changed the schools environment for the better.
At a durbar to hand over the keys to the Head teachers of the four schools, Dr. Theophilus Nkansah, Team Leader/Project Manager of CARE, said CARE will continue to undertake educational interventions that will aid better teaching and learning and improve access in deprived communities to help the country train the needed human resources.
In a speech read on his behalf, the Country, Director of CARE in Ghana, by Mr Richard Oppong, HR/Administration Director, Mr. ElKanah Odembo said due to the involvement of children in farming as well as the limited access to education in the area, the Organisation moved in to save the situation.
The District Chief Executive for AOB, Mr Isaac Odoom, thanked CARE-General Mills partnership for lessening the burden of the Assembly to provide educational infrastructure and urged the Schools Management Committees to ensure that the facilities were properly maintained.
Nana Kweku Esuon II, Chief of Bedum expressed gratitude to CARE International for its numerous assistance, particularly to cocoa farmers in the area, which had helped them to increase their yields to generate revenue to improve their lives.
He expressed concern that encroachers had developed parts of the school lands at Wansabiapa and asked the community to immediately stop the encroachers and urged the children to take their studies seriously, adding that they could excel wherever they found themselves.
Nana Esuon urged the District Assembly to facilitate the construction of the 12 kilometer Cocoa roads from Bedum to Assin Fosu to enable farmers cart their farm produce to the market centres with ease.
CARE is one of the World's leading humanitarian and development organisations, fighting global, poverty and defending the dignity of people around the world since its inception in 1945.