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OLA SHS marks 60th anniversary

The Minister of Education, Professor Naana Jane Opoku-Agyemang, has said the ministry would continue to reinforce values to achieve high productivity in the country’s education sector.

According to the minister, the efforts to check undue absenteeism among school teachers leading to the declaration of “a zero tolerance for teacher absenteeism” was in line with that objective because absenteeism contributed largely to low performance of students.

Prof. Opoku-Agyemang was delivering an address to climax the 60th anniversary celebration of the Our Lady of Apostles (OLA) Senior High School in Ho on Saturday.

She warned that heads of schools who ignored the ministry’s warning to desist from charging fees approved by the Ghana Education Service (GES) would be dealt with accordingly, adding that a national task force would soon be dispatched to schools to monitor those heads whose activities kept many children out of school.

Collaboration with other agencies

Prof. Opoku-Agyemang said the GES had been tasked to collaborate with other agencies to enforce a system that ensured that all those in the education sector were accountable to the public and asked all stakeholders to partner the GES to strengthen the system for better performance.

Speaking on the theme, “60 Years of Holistic Catholic Education For Girls: The Prospects and Challenges”, the Deputy Minister of Environment, Science and Innovations, Dr (Mrs) Bernice Adiko-Heloo, said chastity, respect and discipline were necessary virtues to inculcate in students, pointing out that those continued to guide the Catholic Chuch in the running of their schools.

The Agbogbomefia of Asogli State, Togbe Afede XIV, said the pillars of holistic education were those that made students to aspire for excellence with commitment to hard work and the readiness. According to him, virtues of honesty and unwavering commitment to truth coupled with humility, perseverance and discipline were most required in the pursuit of holistic education.

Academic excellence and moral discipline

In an address, the Catholic Bishop of the Ho Diocese, Most Rev. Francis Anani Kofi Lodonu, said the cry for academic excellence and moral discipline would be elusive unless the government sincerely dialogued with religious bodies for a proper collaboration to raise the standards of schools.

He said heads of institutions and board of governors must be given some autonomy to deal with matters of discipline and to take quick decisions in serious cases and report later to educational authorities.

“We have to realise that we can never fight corruption and indiscipline in the Ghanaian society if we allow these to persist in our educational institutions”, Bishop Lodonu stressed.

In her address, the Headmistress of the school, Mrs Benedicta Afesi, said the school had been scoring 100 per cent pass in the West African Senior Secondary Certificate Examination (WASSCE) from 2005 to date and that one Miss Janet Kwame was adjudged the best candidate in the General Arts programme in the 2011 edition of the examination.

She said the school required accommodation for staff, dormitory blocks and classrooms and the expansion of the dining hall and also appealed for the construction of a sports village for the school.

Eight persons were given prizes for long and meritorious service.  Prominent among them was the assistant headmaster (academic), Mr Lawrence Ochoga Asamoah who retired from the GES on the 60th anniversary celebration of the OLA Senior High School.

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