Located along the old Nchia – Onne road, Government Girls Secondary School, Alode is the fastest growing public secondary school in Eleme Local Government Area of Rivers State.
Looking smart and prim in their navy blue outer and sky-blue inner wear, the students on Monday, September 26, 2022, were ushered into an equally smart, neat and well secured compound for their morning assembly. Their principal, Mrs. Ngozi Sam Okpabi, addressed both the students and teaching staff, before they filed into their respective classrooms.
Founded less than two years ago, the school graduated its first set of students in the junior secondary category, who wrote their junior school certificate examinations, otherwise called Junior WAEC, in May/June, 2022.
Though it has not started admitting students for its senior secondary school programme, the enrolment figure for the school has continued to rise as parents move their female wards from other public secondary schools and even private schools in the area, to the school.
Government Girls Secondary School, Alode is an example of the efforts of a community to secure the girl-child and prepare her for future leadership role in society.
Elder Emmanuel Saloka, the chairman of Alode Community Development Committee (CDC) told National Point that arrangements were being made to secure government approval for the school to start its senior secondary arm.
Parents and locals have been speaking glowingly about the school, saying it is the best initiative that has been made in recent times in Alode to develop the girl child. The school is the only girls-only secondary school in the entire local government area.
Saloka, who initiated the establishment of the school recalled that female children were dropping out of the coeducational secondary schools in the area which was worrisome for parents and the community.
He said they carried out a study which showed that the cases of girl dropout in secondary schools was as a result of their being uncomfortable sharing space with the boys that kept taunting and intimidating them.Besides, early secondary was a critical stage for the development of female children and letting them into unregulated space with the boys sometimes adversely affected their learning process.
“So, we decided to set up a girl’s only school. That is how we started; I and some persons who were interested,” Elder Saloka said. “We started, by March last year, government approved the school and we started Government Girls Secondary School, Alode.”
Having set up the structures, the Rivers State Government stepped in and moved teachers to the school. Mrs. Sam Okpabi was appointed the pioneer principal, while the community arranged for security of the school and its facilities.
Before then, the Port Harcourt Refining Company Limited, had constructed a perimeter fence and totally overhauled the structures in the school compound as its corporate social responsibility to the community.
Among community leaders that supported Elder Saloka during the formative stages was Mrs. Patience Augustus Ebiti, who stood in as the Alode Community women leader.
Mrs. Dorsei Osaroekee, a leading community woman leader told National Point that it was a good thing the school was established in Alode. “It has made an impact on the education of the girl child. People thought the education of the girl child was not important but that is not true,” Mrs. Osaroekee, who is an educationist, said.
“There is so much discipline. I am close to the school principal and I see what she is doing there. Even the teachers are being checked. The children are punctual and the security personnel are also punctual”, she noted.
Mr. Loveday Obari, a lawyer and community stakeholder, who was involved in the processes that led to the establishment of the school said the establishment of the school was informed by the lack of a school to cater exclusively to the education needs of the girl child at that level.
“In this era, we are talking about encouraging our young girls to go to school and we felt that having an all-girls school actually lends support to that philosophy. Our girls need special attention. When you have an all-girls, there are certain conversations that they can freely have among themselves without certain psychological and social limitations that will actually bring out the best in them because it’s all about their own world,” Obari said.
He added that in a world where women are being encouraged to participate in leadership and politics, education should not be a barrier to their aspirations and life ambitions.
Mr. Jonah Okpabi, a writer and author, who is from Alode said the establishment of GGSS, Alode was a fulfilment of a dream he had had for an international girls’ school in Eleme.
“A lot of parents are delighted as well. I saw a lot of women from different places sending their children to the school and withdrawing their daughters from coeducational schools to the girls’ school,” he said. Okpabi however appealed to government to use the opportunity of the growing enrolment in the school to provide it with facilities like laboratories and other sports equipment.
A parent, who simply gave her name as Mrs. Gift, said she had just enrolled her daughter in the school not because it is located near where she has her shop but because of the quality of the school..
“There are cult boys and girls in the mixed school. Here, there is nothing like that. They teach very well and the place is under control. The children are not allowed to run out of the school,” Gift said.
