By DisabilityNewsGH
The desire of some parents who have children with disabilities in the Kassena Nankana Municipality of the Upper East Region to have their children acquire formal education may not happen anytime soon, as they are turned away by the authorities of the only Special School in the Municipality.
The authorities of the Balobia Special School in the Kassena Nankana Municipality of Ghana have been compelled to stop admitting any more children due to a lack of infrastructure.
The school with a population of 34 pupils with different disabilities, has only one classroom block.
The pupils, according to the authorities, are made up of children with mild, moderate, and severe categories of physical and intellectual disabilities, and ideally should be housed in different classrooms to facilitate the teaching of tailor-made lessons.
In an interview with Bolgatanga based Dreams FM monitored by DisabilityNewsGH.com on Facebook live, the Assistant Headmistress of the school, Madam Celestina Ateteba laments that the infrastructure challenge of the school is making things difficult for them.
She says the situation is making it hard for them to attend to the specific educational needs of the children, which is adversely affecting the quality of education at the school.
An educational facility with only one classroom block also means that the authorities are unable to graduate the children to the next stages of their education.
Madam Celestina Ateteba is appealing to the Government, as well as institutions and well-meaning individuals to come to their aid.
The situation at the Balobia Special School is not only a huge setback to the many years of advocacy by disability organizations and civil society groups for children with disabilities to be educated to enable them to realize their potentials like all other children, but also a denial of a fundamental human right.
SOURCE: Dreams FM|Bolgatanga