Pupils' performance in Jirapa district picking up

Jirapa (U/W), Feb. 8, GNA - The performance of pupils who

sat the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) in the

Jirapa District improved, scoring 52 per cent in 2010 as against

49.5 per cent last year. This modest improvement followed an intervention dubbed

"Tackling Education Needs Inclusively (TENI)." It was initiated and being implemented by ProNet North and

Voluntary Service Organization (VSO) with funds from Comic

Relief, an organization in the United Kingdom following a run of

poor BECE results in the district Mr. Martin Bayor, the Jirapa District Director of Education,

said this at a school performance appraisal meeting organized by

ProNet North for selected pupils, parents and teachers in the

district at Jirapa on Monday The five-year intervention programme, which started in the

district last year with the use of Saint Anthony Primary in Jirapa as

the pilot school, is engaging the communities to strengthen

structures to address the challenges in education in the district and

improve girl-child education in particular. Mr. Bayor identified the lack of teachers at all levels of basic

education as the major challenge confronting quality education in

the district He said there was an average of one teacher to over 100

kindergarten pupils while at the Junior High School level it was one

teacher per 48 pupils. He said through the intervention of ProNet North and VSO the

situation has improved with the engagement of more service

persons as teachers in the district. Mr. Martin Dery, Director of ProNet North, said the

intervention did not seek to blame anybody or groups of persons

for the falling standards of education in the district but to identify

the challenges and take practical steps to address them. His organization, he said, was interested in girl-child education

because women suffered the most and education for girls was the

best way of empowering them to break out of the poverty cycle. Lessons that would be learnt from the programme would be

carried to Civil Society and government platforms. Results of Tests administered to primary class three and four

pupils in the 47 schools in the district this year showed an average

score of 46 per cent in Mathematics, 42.5 per cent in English and

31 per cent in Science. Mr. Benard Puozuing, Jirapa District Chief Executive, said the

District Assembly had responded positively to some of the

challenges facing education in the district. These include construction of school structures and provision

of furniture, provision of 6,000 school uniforms by the

government and the increase in the beneficiaries of the school

feeding programme.