The Ghana National Gas Company has announced a reading project dubbed “Turn a page” for pupils in 30 basic schools from the Ellembelle District, Western Region.
Head of Corporate Communications at Ghana Gas, Ernest Owusu Bempah who made the announcement in Takoradi on Monday, May 3, 2021, said the project will target between 27,000 to 30, 000 pupils.
The turn a page is a literacy project which aims to inculcate reading habit among school children between the ages of 6 to 15 years.
He said the project has become necessary following research conducted by the Ghana Education Service (GES) in 2012 which suggested that only 2% of children in Primary Two (2), can read proficiently while 50% of the pupils assessed could not pronounce a single English or Ghanaian word correctly, 44% could read without understanding what they read while four percent could read with some understanding.
He said only 35% of basic school children are proficient in reading.
The project aims to close this gap and aligned with the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goal 4
“As a company we are worried that most of the school-going children especially at the basic level are unable to read well, spell words correctly, we want to see a literate community that can fill up more influential positions at Ghana Gas in the future, he stressed.
He said prior to the concept of Turn a Page project, Ghana Gas had undertaken several educational projects; construction of a four-unit teachers’ quarters at Anokye, Asemnda Suazo, an ultra-modern nursery facility in Asemnda Suazo, donation of educational materials to the Nzulezu Primary School by the Corporate Communication department which worth several thousand Ghana cedis, etc.
Mr Owusu Bempah added that Ghana Gas is implementing social investment project across the sixteen (16) regions in Ghana of which majority of the projects focus on improvement in basic education which complement the key objective of Turn a Page.
“At the end of the project, we intend to provide 15,000 reading materials school children, 95% improvement in reading, comprehension, vocabulary and writing, 50% improvement in the performance of BECE in the long term and provide training for 50 teachers on how to implement effective literacy in the selected schools,” he indicated.
