Church and State Relations: A Pragmatic Conduit for Empowering the Girl Child Through Secondary School Education. A Case Study of Adventist Girls’ Senior High School (ADGISS) Ntonso Ashanti, Ghana

Abstract

The paper focuses on the steady development of the Adventist Girls Senior High School (ADGISS) Ntonso Ashanti, Ghana. It specifically discusses the teething challenges that bedeviled the School and the concerted efforts by transformational leaders, both within the Seventh-day Adventist (SDA) church and the State to ensure the accelerated development of the School. The study further seeks to highlight the point that effective leadership and consensus-building are pivotal to the establishment, maintenance and solidification of educational institutions. The main instruments used for the study were documentary sources (primary and secondary) and oral interviews. The primary documentary sources as one of the major sources were largely composed of files from Kwabre District Education Office, Handing-Over Notes of a School Head, a School log book, Minutes of Board of Governors meetings and statistical reports. Oral interviews were also held with six people who were participants in the study and could therefore provide eye-witness accounts. The information retrieved from the above sources were analysed and discussed thematically. The major findings were that even though the School was set up in 1998 up as a co-educational institution to train the youth to be responsible in future and to support the activities of the SDA Church, it was transformed into a purely female institution after seven years of its existence, to primarily meet the exigencies of the time. The transformation of the School though fraught with challenges, proved to be a blessing in terms of academic excellence, moral development and physical fitness.

Keywords: Adventist, Church, moral development, Adventist Girls Senior High School, Ntonso-Ashanti,