Teachers and teenage girls in Sandema, the capital town of Builsa North District in the Upper West Region of Ghana, have benefited from a five-day workshop dubbed ‘STEM Bootcamp for Girls from Underserved Ghanaian Communities.’
The workshop, which was organised by the US-GH Alumni and sponsored by the US Department of State and the US Embassy in Ghana.
It comprised three sessions: a two-day professional development workshop for science, mathematics, and ICT teachers; a two-day science and robotics workshop for JHS girls, and a mentorship seminar, the distribution of teaching and learning materials (TLMs), and the distribution of sanitary pads to girls and schools.
The students were very excited to take part in the workshop, as they experienced the practical nature of science.
They were taken through food tests and witnessed the occurrence when drops of iodine solution were added to food substances such as kenkey, rice, oranges, water, and banana.
The participants were later taken through electrical circuits and a robotics seminar and a Global Teacher Prize Top 10 Finalist.
Aside from that, the students were guided to build electrical circuits (in series and parallel connections) and assemble robots.
The participants, who were also taught effective study techniques, thanked the workshop’s organizers and pleaded with them to continue holding workshops like this one on a regular basis.
The students further revealed that the hands-on approach used in teaching STEM courses helped rid them of their initial fears of studying STEM courses.
The Public Affairs Officer at the US Embassy in Ghana, Virginia Elliott, was excited about the zeal the students showed and urged them to take advantage of the opportunity that has been afforded them.
“One of the top priorities of the US Embassy is to create opportunities through education to unlock a lot of doors for your future,” she told the visiting students, urging them to look up Education USA for guidance on how to study in the United States.
All materials used during the workshop, including test science kits, test tubes, litmus paper, mathematical sets, charts, and tools for the effective teaching and learning of science, mathematics, and ICT, were given to the participating schools to enable the students to practice more.
