Private schools in Gomoa West to improve facilities or close down

Apam (C/R) Feb. 17 GNA--The Gomoa West District Director of the Ghana Education Service, Mr Fred Dunyoh, has given five months ultimatum to operators of private schools in the district to improve facilities and infrastructure in their schools. Operators, who fail to comply with the directive by the end of June 2010, will have their schools closed down.

Mr. Dunyoh gave the ultimatum at his first meeting with the operators and heads of private schools in the district at Apam on Tuesday. He also read the new guidelines for the establishment of private schools by the Ghana Education Service (GES) to them. Mr. Dunyoh said during his visit to schools in the district he "realized that conditions in some of the schools were nothing to write home about and that he would not sit down unconcerned for the children to suffer". He was not happy that some of the schools operate from kitchens and verandas while other lacked toilets and urinals adding, some of them also operate from poorly ventilated rooms while others have no qualified teachers.

The Chairman of the Gomoa West District branch of the Private School Association, Mr. Hayford Quaye, appealed to members of the association to go by the directives to avoid embarrassment. He expressed concern that private schools teachers who attended courses organised by the GES were denied logistics like travelling and transport and were not supplied with textbooks and called for an end to such discrimination. Mr Kingsley Baidoo, Public Relations Officer of the District Education Office, called on proprietors to ensure that the use of Ghanaians Languages as a means of communication in teaching in primary schools is taken seriously.