Some 593 brilliant but needy students of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) have received laptops to support their education.
The laptops, valued at GH¢2.96 million, were donated by corporate organisations, alumni of the university and some distinguished personalities. Out of the total, Zoomlion Ghana Limited donated 50 as part of its continuous support for higher education in the country.
The package is under a project dubbed; ‘Support One Needy Student with One Laptop’ (SONSOL), initiated by the Vice Chancellor of the university, Prof. Rita Akosua Dickson.
The first set of 593 beneficiaries were selected from over 4,375 applicants. For freshers, their WASSCE aggregates were not to exceed 18 and for continuing students, they should have attained a CWA of at least 55.00. In addition, all students who were already benefiting from any scholarship or bursary above GH¢2,000 were not eligible for the award.
The Vice-Chancellor of KNUST, Prof. Rita Akosua Dickson, noted that the number of eligible students is far above the number of laptops received, so she appealed for more donors to come onboard and help provide the overwhelming backlog of needy students with laptops.
Presenting the 50 laptops to the university, the Director for Communications & Corporate Affairs of Zoomlion Ghana Limited, Emma Akyea-Boakye, said this innovation by the university was in line with the company’s mission of improving lives of the people and their environment.
She believes the laptops will go a long way to assist the students in their research studies, saying that “we are not in normal times and the Covid-19 has turned the world virtual so digital devices for education has becone imperative.”
Emma Akyea-Boakye promised that Jospong Group and Zoomlion will continue to support the university.
Other representatives from Zoomlion present at the function were Corporate Affairs Manager (Zoomlion), Mr. Daniel Ohene Obeng, and General Manager of Ashanti East (Zoomlion Ghana Limited), Mr. Franklin Ofori Akuffo.
Speaking on behalf of the beneficiaries, Henrietta Agyei-Yeboah thanked donors and promised the laptops “will be put to good use to achieve the main aim behind the initiative.”
Companies that supported the initiative included Stanbic Bank, ABSA Bank, CBG, SIC, Vodafone Ghana, Stanbic Bank, ABSA Bank, and Tobinco Group of Companies Others were Multinec Enterprise, Standard Chartered, Director of Urban Roads, Kumasi, Lawyer Agyei Baffour, Andysarp Furniture and Ing. Nana Poku Agyemang.
