EDUCATION

Ghana Library Authority Awards Winners of the National Short Story Writing Challenge

&NewLine;<p>Winners of the National Short Story Challenge&comma; an initiative of the Ghana Library Authority which was introduced as part of its COVID-19 intervention to remotely engage Ghanaian students and to stimulate their creativity through writing have been announced in Accra&period; The project was launched in April 2020 and received 766 entries from across the country&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>At a short ceremony&comma; 6 students received books and cash prizes from the GhLA&period; Nana Egyiriba Amissah Arthur &lpar;12 years&rpar; of Glory Hills International School in Accra and Lois Osei-Sekyereh &lpar;17 years&rpar; of Aburi Girls Senior High School emerged winners in Junior and Senior groups of the National Short Story Writing Challenge respectively and received GHC1000 each&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>Kofi Boateng Budu &lpar;Age 10&rpar; of Angels Ridge School of Accra and Saanvi Mirpuri &lpar;Age 9&rpar; of Ghana International School placed second and third in the junior group and were rewarded with GHC 500 and 300 GHC with Anna Sarfo Nantwi &lpar;Age 13&rpar; of World Links Academy and Addy O&period; Janet &lpar;Age 13&rpar; of Firmons Montessori school also placing second and third in the senior group&period; They also received GHC 500 and GHC 300 respectively&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>Two stories received Honorable mentions and six others were tagged as Promising Stories&period; Participants in these categories received book prizes from the Ghana Library Authority&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>All stories in the mentioned categories will be published on the Ghana Library App for other children to read&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>Speaking on behalf of the Executive Director of the Ghana Library Authority&comma; Mr&period; Samson Osenda&comma; the Head of School and College Libraries department stated&comma; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;This is an investment into their future&comma; not just the winners but all participants&period; Whether your story was selected or not&comma; do not rest on your oars and do not get discouraged too&period; Use this time to sharpen your skills because the future presents more opportunities&period;”<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>&nbsp&semi;&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;I was very happy with the number of entries received&semi; however&comma; I was disappointed by the number of male entries&period; Out of the 766 entries received&comma; only 271 were males&period;&nbsp&semi; As we are empowering young girls to read Science&comma; Technology&comma; Engineering and Mathematics &lpar;STEM&rpar; related subjects&comma; we should also encourage our boys to read&period; Anybody who does not read has made an intentional effort to fail&period;”<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>He expressed his gratitude towards EPP Books and Smartline for their sponsorship&comma; members of the jury and the voluntary readers who helped in the first reading&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>On her part&comma; Dr&period; Mary Ashun&comma; the Chairperson for the jury for writing challenge said&comma; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;I thought it would be fairly easy to choose winners but it really wasn’t&period; Children&comma; you gave us delightful stories to argue about&colon; rags to riches myths&comma; fearsome women warriors&comma; and tearful moments of confronting the death of a loved one&period; We were mesmerized by your tales&period; Our last meeting to decide the winners was fulfilling&comma; as we poured over why each story deserved to move up&period;”<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>She further stated&comma; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;Our country needs more readers&comma; more communicators of the spoken word and with this competition&comma; we realized we do have some&excl; Even more importantly&comma; it was evident that more work needs to be done to encourage more of us to read and what better place to start than with children&period;”<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>Other members of the Jury included Deborah Ahenkorah&comma; founder of Golden Baobab Literature Prize&comma; Eugenia Tachie-Menson&comma; founder of Young Educators Foundation&comma; Samuel Bentil Aggrey&comma; President of the Ghana Library Association and Elliot Agyare&comma; Chief Executive Officer of Smartline Publishing Limited&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>Nana Akua Mensah&comma; the representative for Smartline publishers expressed their delight in sponsoring this maiden writing challenge&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>She noted&comma; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;We always say at Smartline that&comma; if you come to us with anything associated with reading and writing&comma; you’ve struck the right chord&period; So if the GhLA in spite of this pandemic has found another avenue to engage students to display their creative skills in writing&comma; then they deserve to be recognized for their effort&period;”<&sol;p>&NewLine;

Openlife Reporter

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