UWR launches maiden sanitation league table for SHSs

The Upper West Regional Environmental Health and Sanitation Department (REHSD) in conjunction with the Regional Inter-Agency Coordinating Committee on Sanitation (RICCS) on Thursday launched a maiden sanitation league table for all 33 public senior high schools (SHS) in the region at Wa.

The table sought to assess the availability and access to proper sanitation in all public SHS across the region.

The study that led to the design of the league table was based on seven performance indicators labeled as access to latrine by both teaching and non-teaching staff, access to handwashing facilities on campus and the state/status/condition of latrine/ water and sanitation (WASH) facilities on campus.

Others included the open defecation free (ODF) status of the school, general cleanliness and the commitment of the school to WASH.

A consultant with Ideapath Consult, Mr LukemanTahiru who was part of the study team said the main objective for conducting the study was to help improve water, sanitation and hygiene behaviour and services in the SHSs in the region.

He explained that the study sought to examine the state and access to sanitation facilities at the various schools in order to have a substantive document that would aid in advocating improved services in the area of WASH in the schools.

Mr Tahiru said the team uncovered through the study that only three schools had improved sanitation, four could be described as moderately improved, whereas six were marked as fair with the remaining 20 schools revealing very poor sanitary conditions around the school.

He explained that most of the schools in the region had very good latrines but usage and maintenance was problematic as many of them had faeces littered in and around the facilities.

“In some of the institutions we found newly constructed water closet toilets placed under lock because the schools do not have a regular flow of water, leaving the students to practice open defecation especially in the Wa Municipality,” he said.

He also lamented the poor management of waste water in most of the schools and encouraged the heads to mobilise the students to construct local soak-aways to prevent the breeding of mosquitoes.

The Regional Director at the REHSD, Ms Freda Naatu indicated that school sanitation has been identified as a holistic part of sanitation of a community and said efforts were being channelled into the sector together with their partners.

“It will be quite disheartening to have a zonal council or district declared as open defecation free but realise that schools within the area have very bad sanitary conditions,” she said.

The Regional Director of Education, Mr Abdul Razak Korah commended the REHSD for the work done and said it was going to guide official discourse on the demand for such amenities in the schools going forward.

He used the opportunity to encourage the various head teachers to take keen interest in the sanitation of their respective schools for improved sanitation.

Takpo, Sombo and St Augustine’s Senior High Technical Schools all in the Nadowli-Kaleo District, received citations and sanitation tools for emerging first, second and third on the league table.

FROM LYDIA DARLINGTON FORDJOUR, WA