School children at Behinase R/C Basic School in Akuapem-North Municipality in Eastern Region are reportedly dropping out of school due to the absence of a school feeding program
Behinase is a farming community where many inhabitants live below the poverty line hence parents are unable to take care of their children. As a result, the Children attend school on empty stomachs.
Unable to ensure with this hunger, the school children are reportedly dropping out of school for Okada business to earn money to buy food and other needs.
According to the headmaster of the school Kingsford Kalefe, “the school has not benefited from the school feeding program since his tenure of office as the headmaster of the school. As a result, most of the students stay in the house without attending school but to engage in activities that will earn them their daily meals”.
“Due to the unattractive nature of the school and parents unable to cater for their children, some students stop schooling even at the primary level such as basic four and six to rather engage in Okada business to look for money to take care of themselves. So teachers have taken upon themselves to go from one house to another and beg students to come to school”. He said
Behinase JHS is the only Junior High School in the area hence serves other Communities such as Yaw Laga, Kwaku Afum, Kwaku Kre, and Aboagyena in Akuapem north, however, the classroom project initiated by the headmaster has been abandoned due to lack of financial support by the Akuapem North Assembly
Currently, some classes are joined together to receive different levels of learning instructions due to inadequate teachers and a lack of classroom blocks to host the pupils in their various levels of academics.
Solomon Osabu, who is the assembly member of Behinase electoral area also explained that it took the intervention of the headmaster and the community to begin the construction of the Junior High School of which the former MCE for Akuapem north Denis Aboagye also supported the project with a trip of sand, thirty bags of cement, gravels, and pieces of iron rods “but the project has now halted for about three to four months now due to financial issues several requests sent to the assembly but no help”.
This was revealed when an NGO “As I GROW” which is a non-governmental organization reached out to these five communities with activities such as free medical screening, vocational training on pastries, campaign on the effects of the menace of teenage pregnancy, donation of learning materials farming equipment and personal items, education on the importance of education in the rural communities, education on women empowerment, talk on savings and economic empowerment and evangelism.
Debrah Bekoe Isaac who is the CEO of the NGO said, the NGO decided to donate items wealth Ghc130,000 to these communities due to the deprived nature of the communities.
He said the NGO topped it up with sensitization of the youth and teenagers on worrying issues of teenage pregnancy bedeviling the communities and truncating the education of the girl child.
Debrah Bekoe said the doors of the NGO are open to any individuals and philanthropists who wish to support the organization so that they can also extend it to other deprived communities to help address their basic needs.
Source: Mybrytfmonline.com/Obed Ansah
