School For life a Non-Governmental Organisation has appealed to the government to provide the necessary structures to revive the collapsing primary school at Poalarido, a community in the Tatale-Sanguli District of the Northern Region.

The fate of children of school-going-age is hanging in the balance as poor facilities, lack of teachers are mitigating against the community.

The community, also known as South Africa has over 60 houses, where residents are predominantly peasant farmers, engaged in yam, cassava, maize, groundnut, sorghum and millet farming.

This was in a statement signed by Mr Imoro Abdulai, Project Coordinator of the School For Life a Non-Governmental Organisation based in Tamale in the Northern Region.

School for Life provides complimentary educational services to out-of-school children in hard-to-reach communities in Northern Ghana and also provides technical support to both Government and Non-Governmental Organizations through its Learning and Development Centre (LDC) in the area of complementary education and quality education programmes.

It also provides complementary Basic Education (CBE) Programmes, capacity building for teachers from primary schools and community members, development of teaching and learning materials and supports other Organisations to replicate CBE.

IT also designs programmes on quality education and provides training to schools, organisations and government agencies.

The statement said the only primary school, which was established by a community initiative with the aim to get children educated in the area in 1981 by parents with a mud structure and roofed with thatch was later absorbed into a formal/government school later in the 1990 but was collapsing due to several challenges.

“For over 3 years, no school exists in poalarido to educate kids to better their lives in future as all structures have fallen off.”

The statement said in 2000, some parents re-started the collapsed school with a structure and roofed with thatch and quoted the Assemblyman of the electoral area Nokpon Paul Kwabena as lamenting that “We need help in the school to acquire a good structure for pupils to study in.

It also mentioned a lack of furniture/dual/desk for pupils to use as pupils sit on a hardwood log and a lack of teaching and learning materials for the new curriculum introduced by GES.
The statement said the school faced a challenge in school feeding for the pupils to ensure good learning and curb truancy.

Apart from that, the statement added that most of the teachers ride from Tatale, the District capital to teach in the community, a situation that was not helping to ensure close monitoring and appealed for residential accommodation for resident teachers.

They also appealed for a toilet facility to avoid defecating in the bush and to protect them from dangerous reptiles such as snakes.