Parent Teacher Associations (PTAs) and School Management Committees (SMCs) in the Northern Region have been urged to help in the monitoring and supervision of teachers in their localities to improve teaching and learning. Stakeholders in education and health in the Northern Region made the call in Tamale on Thursday during a dissemination workshop on: "Tracking Education and Health Sectors' Expenditure in Ghana", which sought to identify how best they could collaborate and solicit government's support for early release of funds. The workshop was based on a research conducted by Brookings Institution of the United States and the Integrated Social Development Centre (ISODEC), an NGO, on education and health in four districts in Ghana. The Districts were: Nadowli in the Upper West Region, Jaman in the Brong Ahafo Region, Tamale Metropolis in the Northern Region and the Shama Ahanta East Metropolitan Assembly (SAEMA) in the Western Region. The research assessed the recurrent and capital expenditure at both regional and district levels on education and health, as well as processes that would enhance efficiency in the use of public resources. The major concern of the stakeholders was the issue of ineffective monitoring and supervision of teachers and health workers in the rural areas particularly, in the Northern Region, which they said had created an avenue for the teachers to run shift to the detriment of the children's development. Mr Nicholas Adamtey, Acting Coordinator for Budget Advocacy of ISODEC, said the release of government's budgetary allocation to the health and education sectors was slow, a situation which had exacerbated the problems in those areas. He said it was necessary for government to increase supply of logistics to train teachers in rural communities to improve the quality of teaching and learning. There was also the need to sustain the Untrained Teachers' Diploma in Basic Education (UTTDBE), which would help fill the gaps in schools. On the health sector, Mr. Adamtey said Community Health Programmes (CHPS) should also be sustained to improve quality healthcare delivery particularly at the grassroots. Mr. Eric Doorinaah, Executive Director of Northern Network for Education and Development (NNED), said quality education and healthcare delivery could be achieved in the rural areas if pragmatic measures were put in place to fight poverty. He said prolonged draught and floods caused a lot of havoc to crops and property in the three northern regions, which needed the intervention of the international community and NGOs to resettle the people. Others who contributed lauded the National Health Insurance Scheme but advised that it should cover all illness so that the poor could fully benefit from it. Source: GNA