The St Louis College of Education, formerly St Louis Teacher Training College, will on Saturday, October 23, 2010 climax its golden jubilee celebration with a durbar on the theme: "Empowering Women with Academic Moral and Professional Skills for National Development". The First Lady, Mrs Ernestina Naadu Mills, the Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, and other dignitaries are expected to grace the occasion. The St Louis College of Education, located at Mbroom, a suburb of Kumasi, was started on September 23, 1960. It has as its mission the training of female and male (sandwich) teachers morally, professionally and academically to teach competently in basic schools in the country. With its motto as "Dieu Le Veult", meaning That All May Be One, the college has a vision to become the best female College of Education in the Ashanti Region, recognised nation-wide and beyond the West African sub-region for its academic, moral and professional training. For the first year, the college had a temporary quarters at a new site at the St Louis Senior High School built by the Catholic Diocese of Kumasi. It was initially to be a post "B" Certificate Training College for women. The college was founded as a female counterpart of St Joseph's Training College, Bechem, which the Kumasi Diocese founded in 1947. The St Louis sisters from Ireland ran it as its establishment. Sister Mary Consilli, the first Principal, and Sister Mary Vibiani (later Marian Barrette), ran the college with funds partly mobilised from their salaries, the Catholic Diocese of Kumasi, funding agencies abroad and other well-wishers. In its first year, the college had 35 students with three teaching staff -Mary Consilli, Mary Vibiani and Mrs Hagan. Since its inception, the college has gone through a four-year certificate, a specialist certificate to the three-year post secondary programme. It now runs a diploma in basic education programme in foundation studies, education and professional studies. The diploma programme started in 2004/05 while early childhood education was introduced in the 2008/09 academic year. Except for the 1974/75 academic year when it trained men, the college had always trained women. The college runs the Untrained Teachers Diploma in Basic Education four-year Certificate "A" and Diploma in Basic Education (Sandwich) courses. It has so far trained 12,000 teachers since it was founded. According to the Principal of the college, Mrs Mary Anane Druyeh, who is an alumna of the college, there had been lectures and sponsored walk, among other things, as part of the anniversary celebration. She said the college had been able to provide quality education to its students, and expressed the hope that it would in the future offer degree programmes. Mrs Druyeh said the school had a population of 830 as regular students, 350 sandwich students, teaching staff of 54 and 50 non-teaching staff. "We have facilities to take more students about 400 students a year as we have extra classes," he said, adding that the college was able to take 280 students this year as a result of the quota given to it by the Ghana Education Service. The Minister of Education, Mr Alex Tettey-Enyo, said the ministry had "followed with admiration the excellent and brilliant academic performance which keeps improving over the years". "With a sense of purpose, we have confidence that the college can stand the test of time," he said in a message on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of St Louis College of Education. Source: Daily Graphic