Dwarf Islands have no teachers to teach 2000 pupils

Over 2,000 pupils in 21 basic schools on the Dwarf Island in the Kwahu Afram Plains North District have no teachers and one of such unfortunate schools have been closed down, and its pupils distributed to other schools.

The Ghana News Agency (GNA) media auditing and tracking of development project team on a working visit to the District found that there are 29 teachers handling 20 schools from class one to junior high school.

The GNA was informed that all the 29 teachers are retired but still at post to help the pupils since the Ghana Education Service (GES) is yet to replace them and on humanitarian grounds have decided not to desert the pupils.

Mr. Gabriel Adu, the District Director of Education, told the GNA that the Directorate found it difficult to post teachers to the Island because of the high risk involved in travelling on the Volta Lake to the Islands.

“There are a lot of stumps in the Lake, which makes it very risky to travel on. It is difficult to post teachers there,” he said.

Mr. Adu said only speed boats ply the Lake and one had to travel four hours to get to the Dwarf Island on a boat that has no life jackets for its passengers.

He said travelling on the Lake becomes more dangerous between April and June when it is windy and during the rainy season and suggested that the only solution was to train indigenes on the Island as pupil teachers to augment the efforts of the few retired teachers.

Mr. Adu also said his outfit had proposed to the Ministry of Education to offer contracts to more retired teachers, especially those from the Islands, to salvage the situation there since the young ones did not have the interest in getting posted there.

He also suggested sponsoring of Senior High School graduates from the area to the training colleges and to return to teach there.

Mr. Adu appealed to the government to provide safe water transport system to help bridge the gap between the Island and the district capital.

Mr. Samuel Badu-Baiden, the District Coordinating Director, told the GNA that the greatest challenge of the District was accessibility to the Islands.

He said due to the situation, development hardly reached the area because there was no proper means of transport on the Lake and that even if one made an effort it always attracted huge extra costs.

Mr. Badu-Baiden said the assembly was doing all it could to develop the Dwarf Island “because it is inhabited by one-third of the total population of the District.”

He appealed to the government and other private entities or individuals to come to the aid of the District by providing a pontoon on the Lake to transport resources to those on the Dwarf Island.

This story forms part of GNA’s Media Auditing and Tracking of Development at the District level project with funding from Star-Ghana.