Caterham District Scouts

Anthony and his wife, Laura, are both from Caterham. They both went to local schools and Anthony was a Scout with the 5th Caterham Group. Some years ago they applied for Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO), Anthony as a teacher and Laura as a Vet. They were accepted in September for a two-year posting in Northern Ghana; Anthony trying to improve the Science teaching and learning in a number of local schools.

The pupils in Ghana are very keen to learn and schools have none of the discipline problems that seem to trouble some British schools. They do, however, have their own problems which prevent this real enthusiasm for learning among the pupils being translated into results. These problems can be seen very clearly in one of the schools which Anthony is trying to help and which is the subject of our appeal: Bolgatanga Technical Senior Secondary School (Boltech).

The school provides a vocational education for both boy and girl students in carpentry, masonry and motor mechanics. Since 2007, Science has been made a compulsory subject to study at Senior High School level alongside English and Mathematics. Boltech, never having taught Science before, is less equipped than most schools to deliver the curriculum. Science lessons are taught in the dining hall and groups of 70 or more are not unusual. Aware of the critical and urgent need to improve the Science teaching capacity, the Parents and Teachers’ Association (PTA) of the school have recently raised funds (about £200) to convert a small room into a laboratory to store and prepare teaching and learning materials. This involved installing a door, some shelves, a window and a desk. The project was completed last December (2009).

Schools in this area of Ghana often have a random selection of equipment. Well intentioned foreign groups have donated projectors to schools without computers, computers to schools without electricity, Bunsen Burners to schools with no gas, fractional distillation columns to teachers who have never even held a test tube before and corrosive chemicals to schools with nowhere to store them.

Boltech has a committed, enthusiastic and experienced head of Science. She regularly attends workshops to improve her ideas and techniques. She will spend any money raised, with Anthony’s help, on those items that she knows will have the biggest impact on the teaching and learning of Science in her situation. The money you give will enable the 600 students at Boltech, for the first time, to undertake the simple practical experiments described in their teachers’ text books. This will have immeasurable benefit for their development, understanding and enjoyment of Science.