Akosombo dam spillage: POP donates teaching and learning materials to Mepe R/C Basic School

Pencils of Promise (POP), a not-for-profit organization operating in the educational sector, has donated teaching and learning materials to Mepe Roman Catholic (R/C) Primary School in the North Tongu district on Monday, May 6, 2024.

The donation follows the NGO's promise made in 2023 to support teaching and learning in the school following the Akosombo Dam spillage disaster in the area.

POP has supported the school in the past in the areas of water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) and a 6-unit kindergarten block.

The Mepe R/C Basic School was not spared by the floods.

After the floodwaters receded, all nine classrooms in the school were converted into temporary shelters for affected residents.

Academic activities resumed at the school in January 2024.

The teaching and learning materials included story books, exercise books, pens and pencils, erasers, crayons, notebooks, and parcels for teachers.

There are 923 pupils in the school, and each student is to benefit from a specific number of the various items.

POP renovated the nine-unit classrooms and the six-unit kindergarten block and connected the classrooms to electricity; again, they donated 50 pieces of dual wooden desks.

Freeman Gobah, the country director for POP, said the intervention is to alleviate the struggle parents will go through in providing such items to their wards.

He added that this intervention is in line with the organization's core mandate: providing quality education and making it accessible and affordable to all children.

Similar items were sent to another affected school, Mafi Zomayi Basic School, for onward distribution to the teachers and learners.

At the donation ceremony, the Member of Parliament for the area, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, thanked POP for their immense contribution to his constituency.

He noted that his office has supported over one hundred affected teachers in the constituency with a renting allowance of 60 GHC each and issued study scholarships to deserving teachers and voluntary teachers who supported during the peak of the disaster.

Ablakwa, however, appealed to teachers in the area not to seek transfers to leave the constituency.

He pleaded with them to stay and shape the lives of children in the area through education.

Isabella Ayimey, the North Tongu Education Director, also speaking at the event, thanked the NGO for the gesture. She said teaching and learning have returned to normalcy since January.

The organization operates in the Volta, Eastern, and Oti regions of the country.