Awudone Secondary School launches 40th anniversary

Ho, Nov 28, GNA- Mr Mawutor Goh, the Ho District Chief Executive, on Friday said government investment in education was to ensure that opportunities of learning are the same in all schools throughout the country in the nearest future.

He was speaking at the launch of 40th Anniversary celebration of the Awudome Secondary School at Tsito-Awudome in the Volta Region.

It has the theme "Forty years of Secondary School Education In Awudome, Achievements, Challenges and the Way Forward".

Mr Goh, said it should be possible for anybody, irrespective of where he is or the school he attended to attain academic heights that his intelligence and perseverance would allow.

He, however, advised students to reciprocate government's efforts to improve the situation at all levels of education by being disciplined, saying that good school infrastructure alone would not guarantee good academic performance.

Mr Goh said the Ho District Assembly has selected the school for special focus under its schools improvement programme.

The 1.8-kilometre road network in the school would be completed and a 20-seat water closet toilet built for the students.

The main anniversary celebration has been scheduled for February next year at Tsito-Awudome.

Mr Godshold Olympio Bonuedi, the Headmaster, said the school that was founded in 1963 by the Tsito Native Teachers Association (TNTA) and nurtured out of its teething stages by the first Headmaster, Mr Willian Happer Wheeler, and an American volunteer.

It now has 1,772 students, 70 teachers and 62 non-teaching staff. He said the school has consistently done well academically and that out of 338 students presented in the 2003 Senior Secondary School Certificate Examination (SSCE) 159 qualified to enter tertiary institutions.

''Though discipline is generally good, lack of accommodation for tutors on campus is a major problem with the school.

Mr Bonuedi appealed to the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports to provide the school with a vehicle and to complete the Home Economics Block started in 1987 to meet the aspirations of girls who out number boys.

Mr John Adom, Chairman of the School Board, thanked the Parents Teacher Association (PTA) for funding the construction of a dormitory block and a four-unit tutors apartment.

He said the PTA also sponsors an essay competition and extra classes as its contribution to raising standards in the school.

Mr Adom commended past Headmasters for taking the school this far especially Mr Winfred Bonsi, who he said, "transformed the school tremendously".

Mr Nuku Adae, President of the Old Students Union, pledged that as its contribution towards the main anniversary, the Union had decided to put up a computer laboratory, reimburse the school for newly roofed classroom and provide books for the school library.