A total of 5,495 out-of-school children from six districts in the Northern and Upper East Regions can now enroll in the formal school system thanks to the Ghana Complementary Basic Education programme (CBE).

The CBE programme afforded these out-of-school children, who were beyond school starting age (eight to 14), the opportunity to acquire basic literacy and numeracy skills within a period of nine months (October to June) in their mother-tongues to facilitate their enrolment into the formal school system.

AfriKids Ghana, a non-governmental organization, implements the CBE programme and the beneficiary districts include Karaga, Pusiga, Bongo, Talensi, Binduri and Nabdam.

Mr Nicholas Kumah, Director of AfriKids Ghana, who spoke at a ceremony to graduate the out-of-school children from the CBE programme at Nakundugu in the Karaga District of the Northern Region, entreated parents to continue to support their children as they prepared to enter the formal school system.

Mr Kumah said it would be disappointing if parents neglected their responsibilities towards the children adding “I am particularly concerned about the girl children, please, let us support them to go high in education and not push them into early marriage”.

He said Afrikids Ghana had made available 22,000 pieces of exercise books including pencils and erasers to be shared amongst the children to facilitate their academic exercise in school.

He commended the Karaga District Assembly for supporting last year’s CBE graduates with school uniforms expressing the hope that similar assistance would be extended to this year’s graduates.

Mr Imoro Yakubu, District Chief Executive for Karaga said government has placed priority emphasis on education and would continue to ensure that all children of school going age had access to quality education.

Mr Yakubu said the Karaga District Assembly would procure more furniture for basic schools in the district to enable them to accommodate the CBE graduates.

Alhaji Iddi Mahama, Karaga District Director of Education, entreated chiefs in the district to encourage parents to enrol their children in school to ensure that no child was left out of education.