A team from the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF), Ghana has visited Holy Rosary School at Asikasu in Donkorkrom in Ghana’s Eastern Region, to evaluate the impact of the Leadership trainings organised by UNICEF.
The purpose of the May 29, 2024 visit as stated by Mr. Tillman Guenther, a German – born Education Specialist with UNICEF Ghana, who led the team, was to ascertain the impacts of what the school representatives had learnt during the trainings on the school community.
On a whole, the team were very impressed at what they witnessed in Holy Rosary School.
“We are happy to see that there are good results in terms of club activities,” Mr. Guenther affirmed. “We witnessed this morning the Club on Child Protection; it was quite insightful to see the awareness of the club members on Rights of the Child, as well as different aspects of Child Abuse, and what can be done on these aspects,” he stated.
The other members of the team were also very impressed and after watching the children present in their various clubs, they had some down-to-earth interactions with them, in form of questions and answers.
The two main Holy Rosary School clubs visited by the UNICEF Team were the Creativity and Innovation, and the Child Protection Club. The children in the two clubs did some presentations, showcasing some of the skills and talents learnt from the trainings.
What they shared with the guests cut across Children’s Rights and responsibilities and various forms of abuse that a child could be subjected to, and what they could do when they fall victim, for the Child Protection group, and some lectures on creativity and Innovation, presentation of some house-structure carvings produced by the children, and dance, for the Creativity Club, respectively.
As part of the visit, Sr. Stella Nwosu, MSHR, Headmistress of Holy Rosary School took the visitors on a tour round the school compound; they expressed amazement at the sight: “We are happy to have paid this visit today,” their leader said.
In the recent past, UNICEF Ghana, in partnership with the Ghana Education Service had organised a series of Leadership Trainings for prefects and club leaders of various schools in the Kwahu Afram Plains, to which Holy Rosary School was a beneficiary.
In an interview with the writer, Mr. Guenther intimated that the training of selected students from the various schools in the Afram Plains on Leadership Skills was one of the more than forty activities carried out by UNICEF, in partnership with the Ghana Education Service in a project known as Jacobs Foundation founded in Switzerland.
He also underlined that although UNICEF works mainly with Public Schools, they also try to include Private Schools as much as possible:
“UNICEF mainly works with Public Schools, but as we are looking at this project at a kind of all-community approach, and Private Schools as they are present here in the Afram Plains, we try to also include them as much as we can in the trainings,” he said.
The UNICEF Team from Accra was accompanied by some media houses which included: Joy News, Daily Graphic, Ghana News Agency, as well as some staff from the Ghana Education Service (GES), Donkorkrom.
By Sr. Sylvie Lum Cho, MSHR (Sister Communicator)
