16 Teachers rewarded in Agona East under MP’s teachers’ awards scheme
The Member of Parliament for Agona East, Mrs Queenstar Maame Pokuah Sawyerr, has held a maiden teachers’ awards scheme to reward 16 teachers for working to improve education in the district.
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Ms Hilda Mensah, a Class One teacher at the Asafo A.E.D.A. Primary A, was adjudged the Overall Best Teacher in the district. She took home a tricycle and a certificate as her prize, while Mr Enoch Buadu of Akwakwaa A.E.D.A. JHS came second and was presented with a motorbike and a certificate.
The third position was won by Mr Evans Owusu of Amanful Number Two A.E.D.A. JHS. His prize was a gas cooker and a certificate, while each of the awardees from the fourth to the 13th position was given a standing fan and a certificate.
In her quest to improve the speaking and writing of the Fante language a special award was given to Mr Ali Iddrisu, who emerged the Overall Best Fante Teacher. The second position was won by Ms Edith Eshun with Mr Eric Essel taking the third position in that aspect.
The awardees
The awardees were honoured on the scheme dubbed “Maame Pokuah Awards Scheme’’ which has the objective of recognising the individual efforts of teachers towards improving academic performance in the area. The awardees were drawn from 1,242 teachers from public basic and senior high schools in the district.
Last year the MP presented a uniform to all the teachers in the district to be won on Fridays. The objective was to create a unique identity or brand for the teachers in the area.
Mrs Sawyerr also inaugurated a mobile library with an Information and Communications Technology (ICT) facility that would be moved to deprived schools without computers to enable them to undertake practical lessons in ICT to help the students familiarise themselves with the lessons taught in class.
Mrs Sawyerr, who is also the Deputy Central Regional Minister, told the gathering last Friday that her intervention was to motivate the teachers in their work.
She said before winning the election as MP for the area in 2012, the district had recorded 34 per cent pass in the Basic Education Certificate Examinations but due to the efforts of the teachers, the figure had now improved to 74 per cent.
She indicated that the area was very deprived and that the awards scheme was her widow’s mite to serve as a morale booster for the teachers to do their best, stressing that the scheme had come to stay and that every year, deserving teachers would be selected and rewarded.
She congratulated the awardees and urged them to continue to work hard to improve the standard of education, particularly at the basic level in the district and the nation at large.
Fante
She stressed the need for emphasis to be placed on the study of Ghanaian Languages in schools as was being done with English language, pointing out that students must be encouraged to study the local languages such as Fante so that they could be used for effective communication.
The National Organiser of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Mr Kofi Adams, who represented President John Mahama, commended Mrs Sawyerr for her interventions to improve education in the district and urged the teachers to support the government in its quest to improve the level of education in the country.
