Israeli Ambassador calls for empowerment of teachers

Madam Sharon Bar-li

Tamale, July 26, GNA - Madam Sharon Bar-li, the Israeli Ambassador in Ghana, has said it was important for the state to pay much premium on empowering teachers and other care givers in education to ensure improvement in education standards.

She said teachers especially those at the Early Childhood Development centres deserved better than motivation. 'Empowering them through sponsorship abroad would broaden their knowledge and would attract more people to generate interest in teaching'.

Madam Bar-li said when she called on the Tamale Metropolitan Chief Executive, Mr Hanan Abdul-Rahman Gundadow, as part of her tour of the metropolis.

The Ambassador visited four kindergartens which are participating in the Early Childhood Development (ECD) programme undertaken in Tamale by MASHAV, Israel's Agency for International Development Cooperation.

She said an avenue must be created to ensure teachers from rural Ghana benefited from the same opportunities in Accra and Kumasi so as to improve the standards of education in the country especially northern Ghana.

Mad Bar-li said some 30 kindergarten teachers and head teachers attended a two-week training last June on 'Learning through Play', the third in the series in Tamale with MASHAV's specialists who had joined the ongoing Israeli Early Childhood Education project in Kumasi and Accra.

She said MASHAV's Early Childhood Development Education programme was a collaborative effort by Israel's Development Agency, the Ghana Education Service and the Metropolitan Assemblies of Tamale, Accra and Kumasi as means of improving education.

Madam Bar-li said any time she visited Tamale she saw massive infrastructure development and expansion and appealed to policy makers in the Metropolis to ensure that the development went along with improvements in education.

The Ambassador visited the Queen Elizabeth, Lamashegu, Saint Peter's and Danin-Sheli kindergarten schools where she watched lessons being taught according to the training and interacted with the head teachers and some of the children.

Mr Gundadow expressed gratitude to the Israeli government for its support for the development of Tamale especially in area of education.

He said the Assembly was investing in the construction of markets and lorry parks where revenue could be generated to fund infrastructure development including empowering teachers.

Mr Gundadow said that the Tamale Metropolitan Assembly would work with the Metropolitan Directorate of Education to stop the falling standard of education in the motropolis.

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