Endowment fund launched for SPACO's development
An endowment fund with the goal to spur the progress and development of St. Paul’s Senior High School and Minor Seminary (SPACO) at Denu in the Ketu South Municipality in the Volta Region has been launched.
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Led by the St. Paul Old Students’ Association (SPOSA) in collaboration with the Aflao traditional authority, church and the school’s parent teacher association (PTA), the move, part of the transformational agenda for the institution's development, is expected to address the lingering infrastructural deficits and resource inadequacies and change the institution into a category ‘A’ school.
The President of SPOSA, Joshua Sosu, addressing the school’s 65th Anniversary and Speech & Prize-giving Day celebration last Saturday, said the fund aimed at addressing the funding challenges encountered by their alma mater in ensuring its continued growth and prosperity for generations to come.
"The SPACOFUND seeks to strengthen the very pillars that have made our alma mater a beacon of knowledge," he said.
Despite an improvement in students’ performance in the 2022 West African Senior Secondary Certificate Examination (WASSCE), he said the current state of the infrastructure of the 65-year-old school was nothing to write home about.
Infrastructure
The Headmaster of the school, Emmanuel K.H. Dogodzi, in a report, indicated the need to ease congestion in the school's three dormitories by completing the construction of two additional dormitory blocks, which had stalled for the past 12 years.
Mr Dogodzi also bemoaned the deplorable nature of the school's classroom blocks, science laboratory and a science resource centre.
"It is unfortunate to note that all the classroom blocks are in a deplorable state", he added.
Grounded wheels
The headmaster said the school could only boast a 1991 wooden truck donated by VALCO Fund and an Eicher bus donated to the school 10 years ago.
"This bus is no longer road worthy.
The school looks forward to the government providing a new bus for the school.
The P.T.A. benz bus has also broken down, thus inhibiting students from going on field and educational trips," he appealed.
Mr Dogodzi added that the school was presently struggling to cater for its 1,455 student population in its 600 capacity dining hall, and hence requested for a new dining hall complex to cater for the increasing student population.
The school prefect, Owen Tordzro, in a short address, also appealed for computers and ICT peripherals to augment the inadequate computers at the school's computer laboratory, which had hindered the effective study of especially the elective ICT subject.
The Director of Tertiary Education at the Ministry of Education, Professor Yayra Yao Dzakadzie, in a keynote address, called for a robust and collective effort of stakeholders to ensure that geographical barriers did not militate against resourcing schools in remote areas.
He added that those challenges could only be overcome through the collective efforts of various stakeholders involved in the education ecosystem.
SPACOFund
With the institution of the self-help endowment fund dubbed, ‘SPACOFund’, the school would, among others, be resourced with funding for all developmental activities, including rehabilitation, renovation, development and redevelopment of school infrastructure, provision of academic and non-academic facilities and equipment, including books.
Already, with a seed money of GH¢75,000 including donations of GH¢10,000 by the Aflao traditional council, the SPACOFund would also cater for staff and students' performance-driven incentives and awards, support for brilliant needy applicants or newly admitted students of SPACO and also serve as support for staff continuous professional development programmes.
