School for the deaf needs boys' dormitory

Tamale, March, 14, GNA - The headmistress of the Savelugu School for the Deaf, Mrs. Immaculate Atoriyah, has appealed to the government and other stakeholders in education for support to complete the school's boys dormitory.

"The facility which started four years ago is still not completed and management of the school is finding it difficult to house the male pupils, especially when the rains will be starting soon=85," she said. Addressing an Open Day ceremony to mark 32nd Anniversary of the school in Savelugu/ Nantom District of the Northern Region at the weekend, Mrs. Atoriyah said, the school needed to urgently fence its compound to prevent people from encroaching on its land and also to protect the pupils against accidents.

The day was set aside by the School Management Committee and Parents and Teachers Association (PTA) to honour past students who had excelled in their fields of endeavour and also to demonstrate that disability is not inability.

Under the theme: 93Thirty-two years of Deaf Education, Success, Challenges and the Way Forward," the occasion was also used by stakeholders to take stock of their stewardship for the past year and draw up strategies for the future.

Mrs. Atoriyah said the school was located very close to the road, which poses danger to the pupils, saying, 93there is the need for us to get support to be able to build a fence wall to prevent the pupils from playing close to the Tamale- Bolga Road, which is a very busy road."

"Prevention, they say, is better than to cure." She Atoriyah said most of the teachers posted to the school did not turn up due to the many challenges there, including lack of decent accommodation.

She, therefore, congratulated teachers of the school for their zeal to help educate the children.

Giving an overview of the school, Mrs. Atoriyah said the Savelugu School for the Deaf, which runs only disability programmes for the deaf, was established in 1978 as a unit under the Nyohini Rehabilitation Center in Tamale but was later moved to its present location with an initial 12 pupils. It now houses 308 comprising 186 males and 122 females from all over the region. She called on parents who had children with disabilities to send their wards to school because disabled children had potentials, which when harnessed would help the child contribute to nation building. Mr. Sam Nasamu Asibigi, the=A0Deputy Northern=A0Regional=A0Minister, also appealed to parents with children with disabilities in the area to make education a priority in order to acquire enough skills relevant for nation children.

He said: 93Education holds the key to one's success and with adequate knowledge one would attain greater heights. I implore parents not to spend all their money on clothes but use it to provide educational materials for your children."

Mrs Rosemond Blay, the Director of Special Education Division of the Ghana Education Service, in a speech read on her behalf, said integrated and inclusive education programmes had been developed on pilot basis in selected districts alongside the existing segregated special education.

She said that was to enable children with special needs such as the deaf and dumb and the mentally handicapped to gain equal access to equal and quality education from early age to change people's perceptions and impressions about children with disabilities.