Jirapa (UW), Sept. 4, GNA - Mr. Martin Bayor, Jirapa District Director of Education, has appealed to assembly members in the district to include in their byelaws measures that would restrain teachers from commuting more than a specified distance to school. This he said had become necessary because most teachers posted to the rural communities stayed in the towns and commuting to schools in the villages daily to teach, was impacting negatively on academic performance.

Mr. Bayor gave this suggestion at an educational conference for the district at Jirapa, which was attended by teachers, parents and other stakeholders in the educational sector in the district. The conference, which was the second to be organized in the district was initiated by the Voluntary Service Organization (VSO) with the collaboration of PRONET, an NGO and sponsored by COMIC Relief, a British NGO.

Participants examined the development of education in the district and appraised the pitfalls and progress made towards the promotion of educational standards as well as planned and set targets for the next academic year. Mr. Bayor noted that the performance of pupils in the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) had not been good in the district.

He observed that lack of commitment to the job on the part of some teachers, especially head teachers was partly to blame for the situation.

A review of the performance of the pupils in the last BECE examination showed that the district performed poorly in subjects such as English, Mathematics and Science.

Out of the 873 candidates presented for the examination, 428 representing 49.8 per cent were successful.

In some of the schools, not a single girl out of those presented for the examination qualified to enter the Senior High school and this was more glaring in schools in the remote communities of the district. Mr. Bernard Puozuing, Jirapa District Chief Executive, regretted that though non-governmental organizations were doing their best in the education sector, the effort was not reflecting in examination results.

He said the government was meeting its commitment to the sector and it was therefore incumbent on all stakeholders to reciprocate in order to achieve better results.