A new block of six classrooms and a teachers’ bungalow had been completed at Agyareago in the Asante-Akim Central Municipality as part of moves to improve access and quality of education in the predominantly farming community.
This intervention has been hailed as a big relief – an end to decades of struggle for adequate space for smooth academic work.
Funding for the school block came from the Ghana Education Trust (GET-Fund) and the Municipal Assembly took care of the teachers’ accommodation.
Mr Francis Bright Appiadu, the assembly member, summed up the euphoric mood of the population, when he described the structures, as a “dream come true”.
He told the Ghana News Agency (GNA) that the school had over the years had just three classrooms accommodating its six classes.
Keeping children at different academic stages in the same classroom, certainly did not allow for purposeful teaching and learning, he added.
He said what was equally disturbing was the fact that the structure was also weak and old.
Reporters of the nation’s wire service had visited the community under STAR-Ghana’s media auditing and tracking of development projects, an initiative launched to put the spotlight on how government’s resources were helping to transform the lives of the people, particularly those in the rural areas.
The goal is to aid transparency, promote accountability and good governance.
Mr Appiadu said in the past many teachers had declined posting to the school because of not only the unfriendly environment, but the lack of decent accommodation.
Those, who braced the odds, chose to stay at Konongo - a distance away and would often get to school late.
He said the refreshing news was that with the construction of the bungalow, “it now holds high attraction”.
Ms Yaa Mansa, a mother of four, expressed gratefulness to the government for the support and said the expectation was that the teachers and pupils would perform.
She said there was no excuse for anybody to disappoint and that they would want to see radical improvement in the standard of education.