Six Asante-Akim South schools obtained zero percent in BECE

Juaso (Ash), Jan. 27, GNA - Six junior secondary schools (JSS) in the Asante-Akim South District obtained zero percent in the last Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE).

The schools were Formanso Local Authority (LA) JSS, which presented 16 candidates, Kyempo Presbyterian JSS 37, Mouronaim Methodist JSS 21, Yaw Barima L/A, 19, Nkyesa L/A 15 and Gyadamwa L/A 5. Out of a total of 218 candidates from three public schools at Juaso and Yaw Kwei, 129 of them failed completely and a large number of those who passed did not make any good grades to be enrolled in senior secondary schools.

Ms Theresa Owusu Nyarko, Juaso District Director of Education who announced this at a People's Assembly held at Juaso and attended by traditional rulers, assembly members, opinion leaders, heads of departments and NPP activist attributed part of the poor performance to the lack of supervision in schools and inadequate facilities. She said there were schools in the district, which did not have the full complement of teachers for their classes but added that, "unfortunately, the Ghana Education Service (GES) has placed embargo on the recruitment of teachers, because those given placement have not yet been paid their emoluments."

Ms Nyarko pointed out that a class should have an average of 35 pupils and said there were some schools whose total enrolment from primary one to six was less than 70 pupils but which had six teachers.

She explained that her office had embarked on a "Pupil/Teacher Ratio" (PTR) exercise to check pupils' enrolment against the availability of teachers in schools in the district, to enable her to combine classes in some schools with fewer pupils and transfer the excess teachers to other schools, which were crying for instructors.

The District Director expressed concern about the refusal of parents to send their children to school, and said there were classrooms in the rural areas, but pupils to fill them was a problem and appealed to school management committees (SMCs) as well as traditional authorities to take it upon themselves to ensure that children of school going age were enrolled.

Dr Lord Justice Gyamfi-Fenteng, District Chief Executive said the assembly had plans to extend electricity to schools so that teachers could organise night studies as it was in the past, as well as assist pupils with no electricity in their homes to study in the evening. He said towns, which could afford to extend power would be encouraged to do so to enhance the provision of other facilities like telephone and the Internet.