Okuapeman SHS holds Founder’s Day Lecture

Odehye Yirenkyi Atuah, an old boy of Okuapeman Senior High School (SHS) at Akropong, has urged the Ghana Education Service, to consider once again the four-year duration of Secondary Education, since the three years is not adequate.

According to him, the three years was in reality, two and half years, looking at the time for re-opening, and the time of writing the final examinations, and called for a change in the duration.

He believed that the short duration of the current SHS was a contributory factor to most students failing their final examinations, thus increasing remedial schools and classes.

Odehye Atuah who made the call in a speech he delivered at the Sixth Founder’s Lecture of the Okuapeman SHS, indicated that the four-year SHS would give the students ample time to learn and pass well their examinations.

Again, he said, the four-year programme, would also give ample time to the students to participate in extra curricular activities, such as games and sports, which would unearth and develop their talents in the various sporting disciplines.

The Founder of the school, Barrister Opoku Acheampong, had a vision of establishing secondary school at Akropong, to provide quality secondary education even up to the University level, for the people of Akuapem in particular, and Ghana as a whole.

According to the records, , he single handedly established the school with an initial amount of 81,000 pounds, to build the infrastructure, and provide the basic needs for a secondary school at that time, and it was formally opened on February 8, 1957, with 159 boys and 23 girls as the pioneer students.

In 1959, following his sudden death, the school was absorbed into the public education system under the Ghana Education Trust (GET), to ensure that his vision and huge investments made in that direction was expanded and lived on.

The GET in 1959 expanded the structures of the school by building the Dining Hall, Administration Block, Akuffo House, three detached masters’ bungalows and the two storey masters' bungalows.

Barrister Opoku Acheampong served as the first headmaster of the school.

When he died in December 1957, as an honor to his memory, the Founder’s Day Lectures were instituted, to relive his vision and encourage such show of selflessness and patriotism.