Campaign for Female Education (CAMFED), a Non- Governmental Organization (NGO), has launched a program to support the education of needy girls from three districts in the Upper West Region.

The districts are Wa West, Sissala East and Lambussie-Karni districts.

The Program, which is being partnered by UK Aid under the auspices of the Global Poverty Action Fund (GPAF), is also operational in Bawku West and Kpandai in the Upper East and Northern regions respectively.

Mr. Cyril Yabepone, Education Program Officer of CAMFED, said beneficiaries of the program would be selected purely on the basis of need and not brilliance.

He said the aim was to deliver a comprehensive approach towards achieving quality education environment that embraces the needs of all children, especially girls and the vulnerable.

In addition, it seeks to reinforce the Ghana Education Service (GES) commitment to the decentralization of education management by strengthening community involvement in the delivery and monitoring of basic education.

Mr. Yabepone said the core strategies of the initiative include training teacher mentors, to providing pastoral care for vulnerable children and promote gender sensitive teaching and learning materials.

It also seeks to increase female teacher recruitment in rural areas through negotiated in-service teaching program with the GES, as well as strengthening school governance by providing training to School Management Committees (SMCs) and Parent Teacher Associations (PTAs), to step up their capacity in financial oversight and child protection.

It would further improve data collection and use in decision-making and encourage community initiatives by providing reciprocal investment in local initiatives that contributed to school improvement plans and tackle local obstacles to children’s school enrolment and success.

Twenty other partner districts across the Upper East, Northern and Central Regions stand to benefit from the initiative.

Mr. Iddrisu Salifu, the Wa West District Director of Education, thanked CAMFED for selecting his district to implement the program and commended the NGO for coming to partner them to improve on education in the district.**