MEB Special Children's Home opens on 1st January

 A facility that will serve as a home away from home for children with special needs has been established in Apam in the Central Region  to support families raising children with special needs

The facility which will operate as a residential as well as a day care facility for all children especially children with special needs including those with severe forms of cerebral palsy .

It will house the children, feed  and provide care and educational needs at an affordable rate

Madam Mercy Boadu, Founder and Chief Executive of MEB Special Children’s home said: “I come into contact with a lot of children with special needs who are usually neglected because the parents or care givers do not see any bright future for them.”

She said MEB Special Children’s Home will serve as a home away from home for especially children with special needs, however regular children are also welcome.

“We will provide an Individualised educational plan for each child and work closely with the parents to enure that we achieve realistic targets for the children,” she added

Madam Boadu said MEB Special Children’s Home hopes to work with the children to help them become meaningful citizens of Ghana.

“I will train the children as I will train my own children,” she said.

Madam Boadu is a teacher by profession, a head teacher at a basic school in Apam and a mother of a child with cerebral palsy.

Parliament should be a place of refuge for persons with disabilities – Speaker

 The Speaker of Parliament, Prof.Mike Aaron Ocquaye has said that parliament should be a place of refuge for persons with disabilities and the less priviledged.

He said every group of persons in Ghana have a representive in parliament and called on corporate organizations and civil society organizations to embrace  persons with disabilities and make them more comfortable since disability can happen to anyone

Prof. Ocquaye said this when Parliament hosted the Eugenuis Foundation, an organization that cares for the less priviledged in society.

The Speaker of Parliament hosted the Foundation as his contribution to support them ahead of a concert scheduled for 30^th of December for persons with disabilities.

The Concert dubbed “Save a Soul Concert” is on the theme :”Disability is not inability” and will feature groups like the  Star Light Band, a musical group made up of people with visual impairment as well as Minister Isaiah ,  a wheelchair users who leads in worship

Prof. Ocquaye said : “Lets have more of less priviledged persons visit parliament to interact with us” saying “I hope that people will emulate this gesture and even improve upon it.

Members of parliament including the speaker danced and sung along to melodious tunes from the Voices of Democracy choir

Participants at the programme included persons who are visually impaired and mothers of children with cerebral palsy

The Speaker also donated items, including bags of rice, oil, tin fish, diapers and wipes as well as cash amount to participants as his Christmas gift

Mr Eugene Danso, Founder of Eugenuis Foundation in his message of appreciation said the group will like to call on the Speaker of Parliament to be an ambassador for persons with disabilities and help in ensuring that their rights were respected.

Understanding The Special Mothers Project

Stakeholders agree to form alliance to pursue Inclusive Education

A number of Civil Society Organizations and non governmental organizations have joined forced to ensure the effective implementation of the Inclusive Education policy

The Organizations coordinated by the National Resource Centre for Children with Disabilities (NRCCD)  with support from UNESCO, Ghana, organized a forum as part of activities to celebrate the International Day for Persons with Disabities

For its first mandate the alliance is going to ensure the creation of 10 model inclusive schools in  Ghana.

Mr Paul Anoma-Kodieh, Chairman of the National Resource Centre for Children with Disabilities said the schools will be an example of what an inclusive school should be.

The model schools will welcome all children, children with Autism, Cerebral Palsy, Children who are visually impaired, deaf and all kind of disabilities will be put together to be schooled.

As part of the alliance, the stakeholders held a forum on the theme: Dialoguing to Improve Outcomes where they discussed  how to make inclusive education practical

Inclusive education is an educational system that provides opportunity to all children to be educated irrespective of their disabilities

Mr Selassie Sikanku, a person who is visually impaired who shared his experience as a person who had gone through inclusive education said inclusive education helps to build strong bonds and netwroks.

“I made great friends from De Youngsters School who are still very close friends to date, even my best man for my wedding two years ago was a friend from De Youngsters School,...Inclusive education helps widen your netwroks.”

Mrs Hannah Awadzi, Founder and Executive Director of the Special Mothers Project, an advocacy and awareness creation programme on cerebral palsy said educating a child with disability in Ghana is very expensive.

“parents pay three times more than education an average child, we pay for care givers, mobility devices and many more,”

Mrs Awadzi said Inclusive education is possible, what is left is our willingness to do it

Mr Daniel Ofosu, Acting Chief Executive Officer of the Young Men Christian Association (YMCA) pledged YMCA’s committment to inclusive education, saying, “YMCA is offering its facilities to be used for the training of teachers, volunteers, parents and resource person.

The National Development Planning Commission that hosted the forum pledged its comiitment to inclusion in society.

Other organizations that pledged their committment includes, the Special Education Division, Tech Era, Stepping Stones Foundation, Presbyterian Inclusive Child Development, African Rights Initiative, and over 16 other organizations