#GH4STEM TOP 100 Teacher: Josephine Enu Efua Kakra – St. Monica’s Basic A
MAKING S.T.E.M. EDUCATION REAL FOR STUDENTS. ''[I am inspired] when my students approach me with their difficulties.''-- Josephine Enu Efua Kakra
Josephine Efua Kakra Enu comes from Saltpond, but she attended primary school in Berekum and received her diploma in Education from OLA Training School before finally obtaining a degree in Education at the University of Education, Winneba.
When she was younger, Josephine wanted to be an accountant, following in the footsteps of Mr Sekyi, who was her accounting teacher in senior high school. She admired him due to his appearance and his good teaching skills. Being an enterprising and pragmatic person, she does not like being idle and has even engaged in petty trading, before settling on teaching as a profession. She figured that this profession would allow her to make an impact on others, perhaps, recollecting the impact that Mr Sekyi had on her life in senior high school.
As of 2019, Josephine has been teaching for the past nine years and presently handles a combined class of 120 students. She loves teaching, especially the process of making learning real and interactive for her students. She explains that when her students understand what they have learned in class and are able to demonstrate their knowledge or skill, she is motivated and feels fulfilled as an educator. When her students approach her with questions about the things that challenge or baffle them, she feels that she is doing a good job in teaching because it shows her that they truly trust her guidance.
Regarding STEM, Josephine says that she has acquired methods of teaching that help her build her students’ interest in science. She works to keep abreast with current happening in STEM education and improves her knowledge by consistent research. She finds the internet a very good resource, especially the videos on YouTube.
Josephine was introduced to the JUNEOS challenge by the headmistress of Bess MA school. In choosing an experiment for the challenge, she interacted with her students and other teachers before finally making a choice. The interesting thing is that, prior to the JUNEOS programme, she could not conduct experiments in class with her students, as they did not have the required materials. However this has changed. Because of the support and equipment from JUNEOS, Josephine is now able to conduct experiments during lessons. This has made her teaching and learning sessions practical and interesting.
Josephine is grateful to the JUNEOS team for their assistance. She hopes that the JUNEOS initiative will help students to achieve much greater heights in STEM.
When she is not teaching or researching for STEM, she enjoys watching TV. Her favourite celebrity is Wendy Laryea, a newscaster on TV3. As expected, she also enjoys watching the National Maths & Science Quiz.
Kofi Konadu Berko is passionate about education and youth development. He holds a B.A in Adult Education and Human Resource Studies from the University Of Ghana. His works have been published in the historic Afroyoung Adult anthology titled Waterbirds On the Lakeshore, Adabraka: Stories From the Center Of the World, Tampered Press and the Kalahari Review. He blogs at obolokofi.wordpress.com
