SHS: Send your wards to school with gari, other food items – CHASS urges parents

The Conference of Heads of Assisted Senior High Schools (CHASS) has urged parents and guardians of Senior High School (SHS) students to provide their wards with food items upon their return for the academic year.

This comes amid ongoing challenges related to the inadequate supply of food items to schools nationwide, raising concerns over the safety of the students.

It will be recalled that in December 2024, CHASS urged the Ghana Education Service (GES) to postpone the scheduled reopening of schools on 3 January 2025 due to unpaid debts and the insufficient availability of food items. However, the GES proceeded with the reopening of schools, assuring that it would soon resolve the challenges raised.

However, a week after the senior high schools reopened, the National Secretary of CHASS, Primus Baro, revealed that despite the supply of some food items, there is still a deficit in food supplies at the schools. Some of the schools are facing significant shortages.

In an interview with Joy News on Wednesday, 8 January, he disclosed:

Apart from rice, typically, if you take a place like Upper West or Upper East, they do not have any other cereal; you can’t talk about maize or millet. So, it is rice and nothing more.

Some schools, for a long time, including my own school, haven’t had a single gallon of oil. So, my matron, for example, will rely on things like margarine to cook, and the margarine is finished this week.

Mr Baro therefore advised parents to send their wards to school with food items to ensure they are fed amid the shortage.

We would strongly advise that as you send your wards to school, please include attachments. You need to accompany them with gari, shito, sugar, and any other items that will help them survive while on campus.

He also noted ongoing engagements with the education service to resolve the situation.

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