The Armed Forces Senior High School (SHS), have been crowned champions of the Model Bridge competition, an initiative organised by Knight Piesold (KP) Consulting to educate state–owned second cycle schools on civil engineering.
Other participating schools of the model bridge contest were Accra Academy Senior High, O’reilly Senior High, Saint Mary’s Senior High and Presbyterian Senior High, Osu who placed second, third, fourth and fifth respectively.
As part of the event, activities that marked the competition were a bridge display by schools, presentation and demonstration by schools, overview of bridge building rules, bridge inspection and testing by judges, and finally the presentation of awards.
The keenly contested competition in which students within the participating schools were tasked to build a model bridge began with a day’s workshop where students were trained on civil engineering, under the KP Schools Initiative Programme 2015 (SIP) themed: “Building Bridges- Connecting People”.
Mr Robert Boamah, Chairman of SIP, said the fourth edition of SIP had been organised differently as compared to the three previous editions which was a quiz and a debate whereby participating teams were to build a model bridge.
He recounted that KP’s SIP started in 2012, where three schools attended a workshop, followed by a quiz competition after two weeks. There Armed Forces SHS emerged as winners, and West Africa SHS and Saint John’s Grammar came second and third respectively.
He said for the second edition (SIP 2013), a debate was organised for four schools after the workshop, adding that “last year’s edition (2014), which happens to be the third edition saw O’ reilly SHS, Labone SHS and Chemu SHS placed first, second and third respectively”
The Chairman of SIP 2015 stated that with regards to the engineering firm’s programme, the aim was in fulfilment of its corporate social responsibility of educating government second cycle institutions and giving all participating schools items worth prizes.
Mr Boamah on behalf of the Committee expressed gratitude to the Management and staff of KP for their support towards ensuring that SIP successfully accomplished its mission.
In an interview with the Ghana News Agency Mr Boamah noted that the concept of the fourth edition was to introduce students to the practical aspect of civil engineering after SIP provided materials which were used to carry out the task.
This, he said would enable students appreciate and understand what civil engineering was all about; adding that “the demonstration shows students have added value to the skills acquired during the workshop”.
The Chairman said the theme and prizes for the annual event varies from time to time, particularly this year’s winner grabbing a projector, whereas the 2nd took away a water dispenser and a scanner and the 3rd, 4th and 5th took away laminators and books.
Mr Boamah stated that as part of its social corporate responsibility, the company was keen to support the educational sector, which had always been the bedrock of every developing country.
He said in subsequent editions the SIP would target schools located within the mining areas of the country.
Madam Ama Nketiah, an engineer at KP Consulting also told the GNA that the workshop had been organised to highlight civil engineering based on the level (curriculum) of participants so far as second cycle education was concern, and expressed the hope that with time the company would incorporate a larger number of schools.
She stated that the initiative since it began had received positive feedbacks, where participants have moved on to pursue varies engineering degree programmes in the universities.
Madama Nketiah said, as an engineering firm the concept of the training had always been on engineering specifically civil engineering, however with the first edition under SIP, students were exposed to engineering in general, stating that “students were schooled on different aspects of engineering”.
