She said she was impressed with the strong engagement between the teachers and learners culminating in good reading and comprehension among pupils.
The Managing Director said this when she was accompanied by a World Bank delegation to visit the Bank’s financed projects, such as the GALOP.

GALOP, funded by the International Development Association (IDA), supports seven out of the 28 basic schools in the Weija Gbawe Municipality.

Under the project, teachers were trained in differentiated learning and targeted instruction, which included teaching children reading and numeracy skills and the preparation of teacher-learning materials.

The new Gbawe Municipal Basic School participated in the 2021 National Standardised Test for primary four pupils and scored above the average in English and Mathematics.

The national average scores for English and Mathematics were 54 per cent and 46 per cent respectively, against the New Gbawe Basic School scores of 83 per cent and 57 per cent respectively.

Ms. Bjerde was satisfied with the outcome of the project, saying, “What I saw at the school was very engaging, especially with the teachers and the pupils, and the excellent skills exhibited by the teachers to keep the pupils motivated in learning.”

She stated that building strong human capital was an important ingredient in ensuring sustainable development, adding that promoting technical and vocational training would create job opportunities for the youth.

She said the World Bank would work to scale up the project across the country to improve teaching and learning.

“Going forward, we will ask the teachers if they need any support to improve the implementation of the projects,” she added and urged the government to work on the ratio of teachers to pupils to enable the teachers to fully understand the educational needs of pupils and develop innovative ways to address them.

The Reverend John Ntim Fordjour, Deputy Minister of Education, said the total funding under the GALOP was $150 million from IDA, and $60.7 million from Trust Funds spanning from 2019 to 2025.

He said the Project Development Objective was to improve the quality of education in low performing basic schools and strengthen education sector equity and accountability in Ghana.

Rev Fordjour said the project had supported 10,500 schools nationally and that 81 per cent of beneficiary primary schools had a pupil-trained teacher ratio below 50:1, up from a baseline of 75 per cent in 2019.

The Deputy Minister said Ghana was on the journey of educational transformation and poised to position itself to meet 21st-century learning outcomes.
He said the country had created a positive environment for students to learn and thrive in the emerging market space.

The World Bank has been supporting Ghana since 1957 with an active portfolio worth $3.6 billion across 21 active projects, including nutrition, education, finance, social protection, jobs, and digital development.