Students unable to access scholarship scheme
Only one person has benefited from a scholarship scheme instituted for brilliant students in the Dafiama/Bussie/Issa District in the Upper West Region in three years.
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The student, who will leave the Wa Secondary Technical this academic year, remains the only one to have attained the benchmark of aggregate 10 or better required of prospective beneficiaries of the award scheme.
The Member of Parliament for the area, Mr Mathias Asoma Puozaa, has consequently lowered the bar for girls by pegging their mark at aggregate 12 or better in the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE).
Motivation
He said the scholarship package was intended to motivate the average basic level student to seek the grand target of progressing to second cycle school and then reaching the university level.
Mr Puozaa, who donated office equipment to the district directorate of education and refurbished the vehicle of the district director of education at a total cost of GH¢20,000, said the falling standards in education could also be traced to the shortfall in facilities as related to population growth.
“Facilities have not increased and improved to match population growth over the years,” he said, insisting that “the lapses in education are not the making of any government.”
“Despite the recent increase in the number of schools, they have not been enough,” he said.
Mr Puozaa, who is also the chairman of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Education, said the government’s bid to increase school facilities and make them available and accessible in even remote communities were efforts to bridge the deficit gap.
Token donation
While he considered the items – a laser jet photocopier, scanner, a UPS system, a projector screen, a laptop, and a refrigerator, alongside the refurbished pick-up – as a token, he said the challenges that confronted the district made their case a unique one worthy of public mentioning.
The donation was made from the MP’s share of the GETFund meant for development in the educational sector.
The District Chief Executive for the area, Mr Fidelis N. Zumakpeh, said the fact that the district directorate of education was still housed in “borrowed” premises in Dafiama rather than Issa, the district capital, underlined their needy status.
Indeed, the current facility serving as office accommodation for the district directorate of education is an IT centre built a decade ago. Following the transfer of the IT teacher from the district, the building was abandoned until the district education directorate requested for its use upon the creation of the district in 2012.
“This district still faces shortage of personnel, accommodation, office equipment and other logistics,” he said.
