The European Union Resilience against Climate Change (EU-REACH) project has inaugurated Natural Clubs in six schools in the Upper West Region to help educate pupils on the importance of protecting and preserving the environment.
The schools include Samanbo D/A School in the Wa West, St. Paul R/C Basic School, Nadowli Model in the Nadowli-Kaleo District, Gbieri Baptist Basic School in Lawra, Numbeg Basic School, Jirapa and Doodiyiri Basic School in the Wa Municipalities, respectively.
Speaking at the inaugural ceremony at Doodiyiri Basic School at Wa on Monday, the project manager of the EU-REACH, Mr Matthias Berthold said the aim of forming the clubs was to help produce a generation of youth, who when properly schooled on environmental degradation can educate people to halt practices that threaten the environment.
He was convinced that through the clubs, good practices to protect the environment would be strengthened and collective ways of preserving and treasuring nature would also be reinforced.
“Seeing young people concerned about the environment gives us hope and their willingness to learn about how to protect the environment demonstrate their ability to contribute towards sustainable protection of the environment,” he said.
He lamented that the environment was deteriorating and said it was time to wake up and take action to nurture and love the environment in order to save it.
The project manager indicated that the younger generation would suffer the adverse effects of environmental degradation hence, the need to empower them to take steps towards protecting the future of the earth.
The Wa Municipal Director of Education, Ms Sophia Dimah Nandzo, was excited that the project was working with the youth in the region to halt environmental degradation.
She said extra curriculum activities help students to develop their social skills, encourage them to work as teams towards a desired goal and also give them the opportunity to explore areas of interest, in order to build leadership skills.
“Extra curriculum forms an important part of a student’s life, however many students and parents see it as time wasting and prevent their children from indulging in them, but this is actually a myth and students can greatly benefit from these activities,” she said.
She used the opportunity to appeal to the EU-REACH project to extend the club to other schools in the region, to help build the skills of the younger ones.
FROM RAFIA ABDUL RAZAK, WA
