Mr Joseph Bukari Nikpe, Member of Parliament (MP) for Saboba constituency in the Northern Region, has initiated moves in collaboration with World
Vision, an international NGO, to address the perennial mass failures in examinations, especially among Junior High school pupils in the District.
As part of the measures, the MP and World Vision have undertaken to pay tuition fees for final year students of Junior High Schools who are enrolled for holiday extra classes to ensure that they pass their examinations.
Mr Nikpe told the Ghana News Agency in Accra on Tuesday that World Vision last year supported the students with a substantial amount of money for the students to pay their holiday extra class tuition fees while he also contributed GHc2,000 as an initial support.
He said the Northern Regional Minister, Mr Moses Bukari Mabengba, also lauded the idea and made a contribution towards the improvement of education by paying some money to the teachers as motivation to strengthen their efforts to help reverse the decline in educational standards in the area.
Mr Nikpe said education was one of the priority areas of the NDC government, hence the need to devote part of his share of the MPs’ Common fund to address issues of education in the
constituency.
He said apart from assisting with the payment of holiday class fees, he had also supported needy tertiary students from the
constituency to pay their school fees to the tune of GHc21,000 and visited some of them in their respective institutions in the southern sector to interact with them.
The MP said the constant decline in examination performance in the district had been a major concern, which called for the adoption of pragmatic measures to help ensure the production of adequate numbers of graduates who would contribute their quota to the development of the area.
He said within his two-year period as MP in the constituency, he had been able to visit most of the schools in the area and advised the students to tackle their studies seriously since
education was the surest way of guaranteeing their future.
Mr Nikpe said during his tour of some schools, he observed that most of them needed renovation and face-lifts, and gave the assurance that part of his share of the Common Fund would be
used to renovate the most dilapidated ones.
He commended World Vision for its kind support especially in the area of education, the provision of water and other basic necessities for the local communities and pledged to continue to collaborate with them to accelerate the pace of development in the district.
He also expressed gratitude to teachers in the district for continuing to work diligently under trying conditions to bring education to the local communities.