Accra, Jan 25, GNA - The Ghana Institute of Languages

(GIL), has embarked on an electronic information management

capacity building training programme for its staff to facilitate its

admission, registration and administrative procedures. The training programme, which began last year and is

scheduled to be completed by the end of this year, would enhance

the capacity of the academic and administrative staff to

significantly improve the institute's documentation processes. Mr Christopher K. Angkosaala, Acting Director of the GIL,

made this known to the Ghana News Agency (GNA) at one of the

training sessions, organised for lecturers and tutors of the School

of Translators (SOT) and School of Bilingual Secretaryship

(SOB) at the institute's Okponglo campus, near Legon. He said the institute had contracted an information management

system consultant to carry out the programme that would enable

the public to access information about the GIL online. Mr Angkosaala said the programme, which had begun with the

SOT and SOB, and the School of Languages in Accra, would

soon be extended to the other two campuses of the GIL in Kumasi

and Tamale. Mr Daniel P.N.L. Squire, Project Director of OSIS Software

Application, consultants of the programme, said the application

would serve a variety of purposes such as control of admission of

students, registration and payment of fees, staff and students'

records. The system, which the GIL is introducing for the first time, will

also enhance the accounting procedures of the institute, facilitate

the printing of identity cards, and reduce manipulation of marks

and students' access to official records. He said the programme would link up the three academic

facilities, adding that the Kumasi and Tamale campuses of the GIL

would be roped in so that registration of students could take place

anywhere through the internet.

Mr Squire said the recent training programme was the fifth so

far held and gave the assurance that by the end of 2011, the

institute would have finished with the programme and got the

system working. All accounting staff and departmental heads of the GIL, he

said, would undergo a similar training programme. Mrs Rosaline Dan-Dzide, a tutor in Bilingual Secretaryship,

who commented on the programme, said it would facilitate her

work and reduce favouritism and other examination malpractices

associated with the conduct of examinations. "It will also institute a systems control mechanism whereby

students would be obliged to pay their school fees. "I recommend that everyone goes through the course because

it will enable participants to improve further on their work, 93she

stated. Mrs Dan-Dzide said the only challenge she saw with the

programme, was that, though provision had be made for awarding

marks for students' attendance, it would not be used to assess

students' performance. Mr Akwetey Henry Matey, Information Technology Manager

of the GIL, told the GNA that the new technology would replace

the manual system of keeping records. "We realised that whenever students come for records, it

become difficult to retrieve it for them so this course will go a long

way to resolve some of these problems." He said the manual system of keeping information and records

was quite cumbersome hence the decision to adopt the new

system that could generate several documents such as transcripts,

ID cards, and certificates. He expressed the hope that by the beginning of the second

semester, the programme would be operational.