Eleven students suspended over Valentine's Day celebration

Mankessim (C/R), April 2, GNA - Eleven students of the Mankessim Secondary Technical School who escaped to town at night to celebrate the last Valentine's Day have been suspended.

The students, one girl and 10 boys were found not to be in their dormitories when the school authorities organised an unexpected roll call in the night.

Mrs Alice Marie Agyeman, Acting Headmistress of the school who announced this at a Parent-Teacher Association (PTA) meeting at the school expressed concern about how Ghanaians misconstrued the Valentine Day to mean a day for love making and exhorted the churches to help erase the misconception.

Mrs Agyeman expressed concern about lateness of day students to school and urged parents and guardians not to engage their children in commercial activities at moments that they should be in school. The Acting Headmistress was not happy with the academic performance of the students and appealed to parents to co-operate with the tutors by providing their wards with learning materials to improve the situation. She announced plans to expand the dining hall to enable day students to take their lunch at the school to make them learn table manners. She said a classroom project started by her predecessor would be completed.

Mrs Agyeman was not happy with parents default in payment of their wards fees and said over 70 million cedis had been outstanding. She appealed to the parents to improve upon their mode of payment of fees to enable school administration to go on without a hitch. Pastor Peter Kwame Mensah, the chairman of PTA assured the Acting headmistress of the co-operation and support of the association to make her work a success.

Pastor Mensah said the PTA has decided to reward hard working teachers whose students would excel in the Senior Secondary School Certificate Examination (SSSCE).

Mr Oscar Kweku Appiah, Assemblyman of Edumadze-Twafo electoral Area of Mankessim pledged the support of assembly members of the town in improving conditions in the school.