Ahead of World AIDS day which falls on December 1, Paul Krampah, the Ministry’s Public Relations Officer, in an interview with Xfm 95.1 said the Ministry’s HIV/AIDS Secretariat has trained teachers who in turn act as facilitators to educate students on the menace of homosexuality and its adverse consequences including HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases.

According to the Domestic Violence and Victim Support Unit (DOVSSU) of the Ghana Police Service, more teenage boys in the country’s Junior High Schools are becoming victims of sexual abuse.

Many of these young boys and their families, reports say, are reluctant to report such cases to the police, and according to the unit, this has serious implications for the health of these boys.

As a means to check the spread of HIV/AIDS in children, there have been calls on governments to make Sex and Relationships Education (SRE) compulsory within the national educational curriculum.

According to campaigners, putting SRE at the heart of the curriculum, rather than as just an optional add-on, would help ensure young people are equipped with the knowledge and confidence to protect themselves (and others) from HIV, while making them aware of the realities of living with HIV today.

Paul Krampah said it was in this regard the HIV/AIDS secretariat was established, saying, “if you want somebody to be well-versed in an issue, there is the need to train facilitators; the teachers have been trained and they are facilitating the training of students”.

“The schools on regular basis educate the students on the menace of homosexuality. The schools have intensified their training programs. We are very optimistic that in time things will change and the incidence of homosexuality in the country’s schools will be a thing of the past.”

Statistics show that HIV and AIDS have affected young gay men more than any other group of people. In the UK and USA especially, the percentage of young gay men who have been infected with HIV and the percentage with AIDS is much higher than other groups such as heterosexual people or children.

There are also other parts of the world where men who have sex with men, many of who do not identify themselves as gay, are affected by HIV.
Despite the continuing impact of HIV & AIDS, there are signs that awareness is waning among young people. After 30 years of the global fight against HIV/AIDS, this year the global community has committed to focusing on achieving 3 targets: “Zero new HIV infections; Zero discrimination; Zero AIDS-related deaths”, hence, the theme for this year’s celebration: ‘Getting to Zero’.

Date: 9th – 11th December, 2011.

Venue: JASICO Campus

Theme: Distance Education “Its challenges and the way forward for the Teacher”

Guest of Honour: Hon. Dr Kwabena Adjei (Old Boy)

For more information, please contact the following;

Rev. W.Y. Oyiti 0244489861, Mr. Issaka Jacob 0246133708, and Mr. Tsyawo Johnson 0244130864

BRIEF HISTORY OF THE COLLEGE

In 1952, Evangelical Presbyterian Education unit was charged with the responsibility by the government to open the third Teacher Training College. While searching for suitable and permanent site for the College, Peki Blengo initially held the fort.

Two tutors namely the Rev. H.B.K. Ogbete and Mr. P.K Kpeto were appointed from Amedzofe Training College to start the new college. On the 21st of January 1952, the new Teacher Training College was opened with thirty male students at the premises of E.P. Girls Senior School at Peki Blengo.

The College was manned by a Body corporate of Eminent Educationists (which acted as Board Governors). The College adopted the motto “SAPERE AUDE” which means “DARE TO BE WISE”. The College was not referred to as Peki Training College but “Body corporate” or simply “Body Co”.

A German – American missionary, Rev. Eugene Grau who was then working at Peki Blengo was appointed the Acting principal. He taught Religious Knowledge and Messrs Ogbete and Kpeto taught the remaining subjects. In the latter part of 1952, a retired supervisor of Presbyterian schools, Mr. F.D. Harker, a Scottish missionary and a Trained Educationist who worked in and around Begoro in the present day Eastern Region E.P. Education Unit was appointed as the first substantive Principal.

Mr. Harker’s immediate assignment was to expedite action on moving the College to a convenient place in the northern sector of the then Trans Volta Togoland (now Volta Region). Nana Osei Brantuo III, the then chief of Jasikan and the Adontenhene of the Buem Traditional Area accepted to host the College after series of consultations and deliberations among the chiefs of the Northern sector. On December 12th, 1952, the college finally moved to Jasikan.

In 1952, the College attained the full Co – Education status when the first batch of female students numbering fifteen was admitted into the college. The first speech and Prize – Giving Day of the college was held in 1959. Students who excelled academically and in co – curricular activities received laurels.

Today, the College is well noted for High Academic standards, good moral standards, good performance in sports and games, etc.

Come, let us Hail the Name of JASICO and render our Services to her. Yes, come and be part of this Historical Event.

FELLOW MAROONIANS ……………………………………

They should refuse to allow political differences and divergence of opinion to hold back the country’s development. “We must all accept to always seek common ground and pull together to bring socio-economic progress.”

Prof Frimpong-Boateng was speaking at the 40th anniversary celebration and sixth speech and prize giving day of the Toase Senior High School (SHS) at Toase on Wednesday.“Forty (40) years of quality education – The key to socio-economic development” was the theme of the celebration.

Prof Frimpong-Boateng underlined the importance of education, pointing out that, it was the bedrock of human development. He said it was therefore pertinent for the government to give premium to the education sector and put in place the right policies to give proper direction to the youth.

Dr Kwaku Agyemang-Mensah, the Ashanti Regional Minister, commended both past and present managements of the school for their sacrifices and commitment towards the achievement of the noble goals of the founding fathers. The school, he said, had made significant contribution to the nation’s development as its products were found in all sectors including academia, administration and medicine.

Dr Agyemang-Mensah said human resource development was one of the government’s topmost priorities and that it would not relent in its effort at providing schools with the necessary infrastructure, qualified and well motivated teachers and logistics.

Meanwhile, a two-storey boys’ dormitory block had been built for the SHS while work on a block of six classrooms was steadily progressing. Additionally, 1.4 kilometres of its road network was undergoing improvement.

The Regional Minister advised the students to be disciplined and to take their studies seriously. Mr Stephen Annor-Yeboah, the Headmaster, described the academic performance of the school as impressive.

In 2009, out of the 601 candidates presented for the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE), 526 scored between six and eight passes. For year 2011, the school scored 100 per cent pass, with 529 out of the total of the 538 candidates, scoring between six and eight passes, he added.

The main opposition New Patriotic Party MP also pledged to contribute the same amount annually to the Fund to enable the Chief of Tamale, Naa Dakpema Dawuni Alhassan achieve his aim of assisting brilliant but needy students to acquire higher academic laurels.

Additionally, he promised to build two factories in Tamale to reduce the high rate of youth unemployment in the area.
The Assin North MP recognised youth unemployment as the major cause of political and chieftaincy upheavals in the north, hence his decision to build the two factories in Tamale.

Hon. Agyepong made the promise during a courtesy call on the Chief of Tamale over the weekend.

The visit was part of his campaign tour of the northern region ahead of the NPP Flag bearer, Nana Akufo Addo’s scheduled visit to the northern region on December 5. He appealed to residents of the area to attract more investors to the entire northern region through peaceful co-existence.

Naa Dakpema Dawuni Alhassan, the Tamale Chief commended Hon. Agyepong for his vision for the north. He implored the youth to be inspired by the Assin North MP’s humanitarian services and rise up to the challenge of global competitiveness.

Naa Dakpema promised to later honour Hon. Agyepong with a chieftaincy title in February 2012. Hon. Agyepong later addressed NPP youth groups in the Tamale Metropolis including the University for Development Chapter of the Tertiary Education Students Confederacy of the NPP and the Danquah Ladies.

She says the corrupt nature of the Service is preventing donor institutions and development partners from extending financial support to the sector.

Ms. Sawyer made this disclosure recently in Accra when she addressed a consultative meeting on Girls Education organized by the Greater Accra Chapter of the GNECC.

According to Ms. Sawyer, GES does not have good managerial structures in place hence funding destined for specific projects and activities are inappropriately managed “and fund finds its way into individual pockets.”

She has therefore advised that, if authorities at GES do not see the need to put in place good structures to govern the sector in order to attract donor funding, then education standards at the public schools will continue to fall resulting in failure among pupils in the public schools.

She noted that, 99% of teachers in public schools can teach much better than their colleagues in private schools but due to inadequate teaching and learning materials and incentives, teachers in the public schools are unwilling to teach at their optimum.

He said fish farming is lucrative in the Tarkwa-Nsuaem Municipality and assured the youths who desire to go into it that they would be supported to succeed.

Mr. Adu-Mensah told the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in Takoradi that the youth of the country needed to re-orient their mind-set that the government has to employ them after school.

“It is time the youth in this country take their destiny into their own hands and create jobs for themselves instead of relying on white-colour jobs that are not readily available these days,” he said.

He said that in view of poor catch in recent times by fishermen because of illegal fishing practices, it would be prudent and beneficial for the youths to go into fish farming.

He said the fees also differed from one level to another and included those on academic user fees, Information and Communication Technology health care, examination, identity card, medical examination, sports.

Mr Ayariga, who appeared before Parliament to answer questions concerning the ministry, gave details of approved fees being charged by public universities including the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), the University of Ghana (UG) and University of Cape Coast (UCC).

The Minister said the UG charged the lowest fess as compared to the other universities. He said undergraduate fresh students in UG paid, GH¢486.00 in the humanities, Administration GH¢541.00, Sciences, GH¢571, Applied Sciences, GH¢644.00, and Veterinary, GH¢614.00.

Mr Ayariga said KNUST fresh students paid GH¢858.58 for the Humanities, GH¢927.43 for the Sciences and GH¢1,035.45 for Medicine.
The UCC charged GH¢1,070.00 is paid for Humanities, GH¢1,141.00, for the Sciences, Medicine, GH¢1,173.00 and GH¢1,044.00 for Business Administration. He said that all fees included those on Student Representative Council and Departmental Hall.

The first president of the Republic, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, introduced fee-free basic education in 1963, while tuition at the university level was free. Other interventions such as education reforms have ever since been implemented.

We are enjoined by the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to increase access to education at the basic level by 2015 and policies such as the capitation grant and the school feeding programme have been put in place to ensure the attainment of that goal.

About three decades ago, Ghana could only boast of three public universities and three polytechnics, but today there are six public universities and we are working hard for more while we have established seven other polytechnics.

There are about two scores of private universities offering higher education for those who would have been excluded if the efforts of the state were not complemented by the private sector.

It is not just a question of the quantity of educational facilities that matters but the quality of education must be of paramount concern to everybody. Educational facilities are dotted across the length and breadth of the country, but the quality of these facilities and even the services delivered by teachers and education administrators cannot be said to be the best in all cases.

Some of our children still attend classes in what has now become known as “school under trees”, dilapidated structures without seating facilities such that pupils lie on their bellies to take notes from teachers. In these circumstances, even the most gifted students would not be able to achieve his or her academic goals.

The Daily Graphic is aware that the government, religious bodies and private individuals are doing their best to update facilities at all levels, except that so far, action has been a bit slow to register the desired results.

It is in this context that we commend the First Lady, Mrs Ernestina Naadu Mills, for donating an eleven-classroom block to the chiefs and people of Bornikope in the Dangme East District in the Greater Accra Region.The project, initiated by Mrs Mills’s community-based organisation, Foundation for Child Education (FCE), consists of two classrooms for early childhood development, six classrooms for the primary school, and three classrooms for the Junior High School ((JHS). It also has an assembly hall, a clinic, a computer laboratory, offices, a staff common room and a water system.

While we commend Mrs Mills for her bold effort to bridge the gap between education in the rural and urban area, we urge the community to take advantage of the facility to provide the best for their children so that they can take their rightful place in society.

The First Lady summed up the challenges facing our educational system, especially in most rural settings, when she named them to include inadequate infrastructure, poor resources in rural communities, weak institutional arrangements for supervision and inability of parents to afford quality education.

We know that the state is overburdened to request from its people and institutions, but there are certain facilities that must be provided at all costs, if our national development efforts are to be on track.

The Daily Graphic calls on the government to use this year’s budget to set a definitive time frame, perhaps five years or a decade, within which the poor conditions under which teaching and learning are undertaken in the rural areas will belong to history.

This is a national imperative that must be demanded from our leaders, while encouraging them to look for the resources to undertake such projects.

Once again we salute the First Lady for this gesture, but we urge all those who are better endowed in our society to adopt communities to provide such facilities for the sake of our children who are the future leaders of our country.

To the people of Bornikope, we urge them to take good care of the facility and encourage their children to learn hard, so that the school facility will bring about change in the community. The teachers are also urged to put in their best.

Although since 2008, no survey had been conducted, there were still reported cases of unsafe abortions across the campuses including the Senior High schools in Ghana and that called for constant and sustainable education programs on safe abortion.

Ms Bashiratu Kamal of Ipas, an International organization working in the area of safe motherhood and maternal health, disclosed this in an interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA) during an education seminar on dangers of abortion at the All Nations University College (ANU) in Koforidua on Tuesday.

She said the issue of abortion was now critical to the reduction of maternal death in Ghana in that abortion related deaths contributed 11 per cent to maternal mortality in the country.

Ms Kamal said many people resorted to unhealthy methods in aborting unwanted pregnancies because of the difficulty in accessing medical care and the stigma that persisted some years ago.

She appealed to the media houses to use their mediums to educate the public that there were abortion care services in all health facilities in the country and so they should go to medical centres for their abortion need than using the unacceptable methods, which could led to complications and even death.

Ms Cynthia Tawiah also from Ipas said Ipas was working on a project to reduce abortion deaths and complications. As part of the project, Ipas had trained doctors and midwives who are allowed to handle abortion cases in many public health facilities.

She said their emphasis had been the promotion and use of manual vacuum aspiration and medication abortion for all abortion cases which had been recommended by the World Health organization (WHO).

Ms Tawiah said so far the training of doctors and midwives to handle abortion cases in public health facilities had covered Ashanti, Eastern, Greater Accra and the three Northern Regions.

She therefore called on all to patronize the public health facilities for any abortion to save lives, adding that the issue of stigma and unwelcoming reception which was the case formally had been taken care of.

The Women’s Commissioner of the ANU, Ms Golda Anambane, noted that many people resorted to unhealthy methods because of financial constraints and appealed that the National Health Insurance Scheme should be made to cover abortions.