Authorities of the Nabaango Senior High Technical School in the Kasena-Nankana West District of the Upper East Region are appealing to government to support the school with proper classroom blocks.

The school started operating in November 2010 as a Community Day SHS and was absorbed by government in December 2016.

It is now a partial boarding school serving the people of Nabaango, Mirigu, Sirigu and surrounding areas. But lack of infrastructure has compelled authorities to continue to operate the school from a dilapidated primary school block.

With a student population of more than 500, the girls at Nabaango SHTS currently stay in a private residence that has been rented by the community and converted into a dormitory for them.

The boys have to come to school from their various homes. Where one home is too far from the school, then their parents will have to rent rooms for them within the community, where they can stay and attend classes.

Senior Prefect of the school, George Avooti tells Joy News the situation makes learning too burdensome for students.

“I believe that we can still pass our exams despite the difficult environment of the school but the truth is that we are over-stretched because of the lack of infrastructure” he said.

“This school is a like a century behind civilization. Just a look at the structure of the school alone should tell you that a lot of things need to be put in place to enhance learning. We don’t even have enough furniture.

"Sometimes, when we come in the evenings for preps, those who come late don’t get chairs to sit on so they have to be hanging around”, Avooti lamented.

A group of community members of Nabaango have recently come together and mobilized some furniture for Nabaango SHTS.

Leader of the group, Dr. Akanboe Ayirebasia who is also the Board Chairman of the school said the iron-made classroom furniture were bought with funds raised after they appealed to well-meaning members of the community.

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“We realized the school has been turned into a WAEC exams center and yet they don’t have furniture”, Dr. Ayirebasia said, indicating that the single-seater desks they provided were only 75 out of a total number of 263 needed in the school.

“So we still have to try and supply as much furniture as we can”, he added.

Headmaster of the Nabaango Senior High School, Augustine Atanga has told Joy News that a new site has been provided by the community for the school to be relocated because government had earmarked some new infrastructure to be constructed for the school before the Covid-19 pandemic brought things to a standstill.

“The government had plans to build us a new school block but because of COVID-19, it is on hold. We hope it will take place very, very soon, for us to have our classroom block and other infrastructure sited on our new site”, the headmaster said.

Mr Atanga said despite the infrastructure deficit, the school had a record number of 363 candidates sitting for the WASSCE this year, an increase from only 29 last year.

He attributed this to the Free SHS policy introduced by the current NPP government.

 “The school almost ground to a halt due to parents’ inability to pay fees, leading to low enrollment figures. The Free SHS program is the reason for our continuous existence as a school”, the headmaster said.

He also revealed that government has recently given the Nabaango SHTS a school bus.