Bishop Herman College launches 60th anniversary celebration

The Old Students Association of Bishop Herman College, in the Volta Region, on Wednesday launched an Endowment Fund in Accra, as part of activities to mark the College's 60th anniversary celebration.

Professor Ernest Dumor, Chairman of the 60th Anniversary Planning Committee of the College, said the fund was being established in recognition of the need for sustained resource inflows to the educational institution as well as financing educational excellence to ensure that “This great Catholic institution can offer the widest range of educational opportunities to all students”.

He said given the challenge that the College was established in 1952, and faced in the 21st Century, the old students had also inaugurated a strategic plan to reposition it to continue to be a great Catholic institution.

The celebration that would be on the theme: “Bishop Herman College@60; A Great Catholic Institution”, would feature events like anniversary lecture, home coming, medical outreach, dinner dance, a grand durbar, and thanksgiving service at the Holy Spirit Cathedral in Accra.

Prof. Dumor, old boy of the College, said the Catholic school was the basis for genuine apostolic mission of the church, therefore, the College was at the heart of the religious body and a genuine instrument of the church - a place of real and specific pastoral ministry.

He said the church’s educational project must be revisited in the face of the extreme secularism and materialism, and its consequences and impart on the formation of the young and stressed the need to address the broader and relevant issues regarding the Catholic education project.

Mr Kofi Humado, Minister of Youth and Sports, who donated GHC 1, 000 towards the establishment of the Fund, said the celebration was a good tool to bring together all old students and serve as a platform to take stock of achievements and plan the way forward.

He stressed on the need to inculcate into the youth, a sense of volunteerism and patriotism that stems from a world view of what society ought to be.

Mr Humado said that was why the national youth policy with its action plan was launched by the Government in 2010, to empower the youth to impact positively on national development.

He asked authorities of second cycle educational institutions to encourage students to participate in leadership clubs such as cadets’ corps, green clubs, Rotaract clubs, debate clubs, and youth Parliaments to prepare them for the future.

Reverend Father Francis Lodonu, Catholic Bishop of Ho, and an old boy, narrated the history of the school, and said as a member of the third batch of students of the College, they had four years of secondary education after having gone through six years of primary school and four years of middle school.

He said that the four years secondary education they went through equipped them so well for further training, and stressed that the current three years senior high school education must be made four years “Leaving out all politics with only the welfare of our children to be taken into consideration”.

Rev. Father Walter Agbetoh, Headmaster, said the College had seen steady rise in its academic results and was the first topmost school in the Region in 2011.

He appealed to the old boys association to assist the College to rehabilitate its dining hall and the old chapel and said through the GETFund, the College had experienced some infrastructural developments including classroom blocks and dormitories.