By Jesse Ampah Owusu,
Accra, July 31, GNA – The Government Technical Institute (Govtech) has appealed to government, old students and philanthropists to help it stock its new Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Centre with computers.
The mechanical engineering training school has designated one of its offices as an ICT centre but lacks the computers to make it functional.
Mr Emmanuel Kwafo Offei, Principal of the Institute, made the appeal during its 55th anniversary launch in Accra.
He said the Govtech since its establishment had lacked an ICT Centre to facilitate practical teaching and learning of modern mechatronics training.
The principal added that the teachers and learners relied on some few computers at the school’s library.
He said they were hoping to receive 30 computers before their main anniversary programme on October 28, 2023, when they were hoping to inaugurate the ICT Centre officially as their anniversary project.
The Institute, Mr Offei said, had trained students in automative and its allied trades namely welding and fabrication, auto electricals, and auto body repairs to meet the technical manpower requirements of road transport sectors of the economy.
He stressed that the Institute had over the years trained more than 8,000 young people in the road transport sector.
“Academically, students presented for the NVTI and COTVET examinations have performed satisfactory over the years with some currently heading their institutions where they are gainfully employed,” he added.
Mr Offei urged the Ghana Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) Service to construct a 150-capacity hostel facility for students and a one-storey building to serve as residence for the Vice Principal and the house master, as proposed.
Master Derick Tetteh, Head Prefect of the Institute, called on Government to retool their library and training workshop centre to aid their learning in school.
He said the two centres since the establishment of the school had seen no facelift and were filled with dilapidated and outmoded books and equipment.
He, however, commended the Government for employing enough teachers for their school, saying, hitherto they had few teachers.
The Government Technical Institute formerly Government Technical Training Centre was established in 1968 as a result of a joint Technical Cooperative Agreement signed between the Government of Ghana and the then Federal Republic of Germany on December 28, 1966.
However, a supplementary agreement of the main agreement was for the Government of the then Federal Republic of German to supply 150 Albion Buses to the then Ominibus Service Authority (OSA) to augment its fleet.
The Institute was, thus, setup as an in-service training centre for the mechanics and middle level technical staff of then OSA who were to maintain the buses and serve as a Centre for the impartation of technical skills to the Ghanaian youth in the automobile and allied trades.
GNA