On Wednesday, July 27th, the African Renaissance Movement (ARM) of Ashesi University College organized a speech and prize-giving day for the Rangoon Basic School in Labone. The central theme for the event was, “Rewarding Leadership and Academic Excellence.” This was the first ceremony of its kind in the school’s 59-year history.
In his welcome address, the headmaster of the school thanked the African Renaissance Movement and the Ashesi community for their continued efforts in supporting the Rangoon School and its students. He believed that the students of Ashesi served as good role models for the students at Rangoon, and encouraged his students to recognize them as such.
The African Renaissance Movement began its collaboration with the Rangoon School two years ago, and together with the Ashesi community has been involved in extensive volunteer work at the Rangoon school. The partnership with the school’s teachers and authorities has begun yielding impressive results. Students of the Rangoon School achieved the best performance in its district in the last Basic Education Certificate Examinations.
In his speech during the event, ARM President Steven Odarteifio pointed out that in organizing the event, it was the ARM’s hope that students in the school would be given the chance to realize and release more of their potential. He encouraged the students of the Rangoon school to refuse to let their school’s limited facilities and circumstances limit their academic pursuits.
Awards given to students included those for overall academic performance, leadership and general excellence. The general excellence award was given to the Senior Prefect of the school Kingsford Obu, for demonstrating exemplary leadership qualities amongst his peers.
Chairman for the programme, Dr. Patrick Awuah, congratulated the award winners and encouraged the children to strive to improve themselves even further. He congratulated both the teachers and parents, and thanked the student members of the ARM for the incredible work they were doing at the Rangoon School. He further explained that though Ashesi would be moving from Labone to its permanent campus in Berekuso, the university would continue to support the basic school as much it could.
Together with their donors, the ARM has already taken several steps to help improve the Rangoon school’s facilities, including the setting up a small library. Future plans for the partnership include raising funds to build a one storey computer lab for the school.