The Centre for Sustainable Rural Development (CESRUD) in collaboration with Biblionef Ghana has commissioned an ultra-modern community library at Sumbrungu in the Bolgatanga Municipality to encourage reading in the area.

The library, which is stocked with current and relevant reading materials for children, young adults and adults, has computers, television set and some mattresses to allow the children to rest as well as create conducive environment for readers, especially children to develop and cultivate the habit of reading.

The community library, which is fully funded by the Lions Club International, a Non-Governmental Organisation (NGOs) was in fulfilment of a pledge made to the people of Sumbrungu to construct a community library in the area and to stock it with books to encourage reading amount pupils and students to promote quality education.

The Netherlands NGO with support from the Biblionef Ghana and CESRUD established mini-libraries and stocked them with relevant books in all the 20 basic schools in the Bolgatanga West “B” Circuit last November to instil in the pupils the desire to read and improve their academic performances.

CESRUD is a community based non-profit making organisation working in the areas of basic education and women livelihoods improvement, as well as youth entrepreneurial empowerment at Sumbrungu in the Bolgatanga Municipality, while Biblionef is an institution focused on creating conducive environment for less privileged children to have access to books and getting children to recognise that reading was indeed an enjoyable activity.

The event was also an occasion to assess the performance of the selected library teachers from the beneficiary schools, who were given library managerial training and refresher courses to man the various school libraries.

Speaking at the commissioning of the project, Mrs Patricia Arthur, Executive Director of Biblionef Ghana, said quality education at the basic level was critical in shaping the academic performance of children, hence the need to inculcate in them the habit of reading and making reading and learning materials available; and accessible to pupils in less privileged communities.

She said “the pupils at the basic schools are very intelligent and smart but they need our support, especially the stakeholders in education to assist them to improve their knowledge and compete with their colleagues in other schools.”

While commending the teachers for their efforts to help the pupils, the Executive Director indicated that the pupils needed to be encouraged to develop interest for reading, “make a paradigm shift from the technical methods of reading, such as reading competition to reading activities that creates fun to make it enjoyable.”

Mr Rex Asanga, the Executive Director of CESRUD who expressed gratitude to the sponsors for their efforts to encourage reading and improve on education in the community, said the intervention was a good move in salvaging the schools from the abysmal performances at the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) level.

He encouraged the teachers to give off their best to improve on the performance of the pupils by putting the facilities to good use to derive maximum benefit.

Lioness Wia Huisman, a Netherlands Consultant of the Lions Club International who took the teachers through some training on how to make reading interesting to children, admonished them to cultivate the habit of writing about their immediate environment.