Akwatia, May 13. GNA - Mr Samuel Bannerman-Mensah, Director-General of the Ghana Education Service (GES), has said a unit had been created at the Technical and Vocational Education Division of the GES under the name Women in Technical Education (WITED) in order to encourage girls in technical education. He said one of its functions was to seek the welfare of females in technical and vocational education. In a speech read for him at the 44th speech and prize-giving day celebration of St Roses Senior High School at Akwatia, Mr Bannerman-Mensah said the unit was working in close collaboration with the Ghana Chamber of Mines. He said the unit had set up a support scheme of GHC 1,000 to assist brilliant but needy girls pursuing male dominated technical trades in technical institutes in areas such as electrical installation, welding, auto mechanics, and block-work and concreting, construction and painting and decoration.

The Director-General said success chalked in the national enrolment profile for girls from kindergarten to senior high-school between 2005/2006 to 2007/2008 academic year had been impressive. Percentage increase in enrolment of girls at the kindergarten level rose from 48.8 percent in the 2005/2006 academic year to 49.9 percent in the 2006/2007 academic year. In the year 2007/2008, there was slight decrease of two percent bringing the rate of girl's enrolment to 49.7 percent. At the primary school level, the percentage of 48.5 was kept consistent for two academic years 2005/2006 adding that for 2006/2007 academic year the enrolment of girls rose to 48.6 percent. Mr Bannerman-Mensah said at the Junior High School level, the percentage of girl's enrolment was 45.3 percent in 2005/2006 academic year and this rose phenomenally to 46.6 percent in the 2006/2007 academic year, adding that the figure was maintained in the 2007/2008 academic year.

At the Senior High School level, percentage enrolment of girls was 43.1 percent in the 2005/2006 academic year and this increased to 43.8 percent in 2006/2007. There was a slight drop of one percent in 2007/2008 bringing it to 43.7 percent recording a slower rate of increase than at the Primary and Junior High School levels. Touching on the Science, Mathematics and Technology Program launched in 1987 to help narrow the gender imbalance in the study and application of science, he said its decentralization had made it possible to reach out to as many as 30,000 girls throughout the country within the last seven years. 13 May 09