H.E. Christoph Retzlaff, the Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to Ghana, has visited OYSKA Institute of Cosmetology in Kumasi to get acquainted with the activities of Ghana Skills Development Initiative (GSDI) and Ghana TVET Voucher Programme (GTVP). The Ambassador was welcomed by Ms. Ohemaa Yaa Serwaa-Kyerewaa Awuah, Director of OYSKA.
The field trip was also attended by Mr. Alan Walsch, Country Director of GIZ, Mr. Christian Widmann, Head of the Programme for Sustainable Economic Development (PSED), Mr. Philip Graf von Schwerin, Director of KfW Office Accra, members from the Ghana Progressive Hairdressers and Beauticians Association (GPHABA), and other GSDI partners.
OYSKA is a private training provider which started offering cosmetology courses in 2007. GSDI started collaborating with the school to introduce the Collaborative Apprenticeship Training (CAT) approach when the project reached out to Ashanti Region in 2016. School staff has been trained in Competency-Based Training, pedagogics, and school management. Currently, 40 master craftspersons (MCP) from the informal sector are being trained at OYSKA under the GTVP.
After a round tour of the facilities at the institute, the delegation held a round table discussion with some of the beneficiaries who shared their experiences from the project. “Client care was a big challenge to me but I have realized that the customer is key.” one MCP stated. The beneficiaries expressed gratitude to the project for the various trainings and appealed for additional capacity building programmes. The ambassador commended the work of GSDI and GTVP and encouraged the project to further support the developed approach to modernize the traditional apprenticeship system and contribute to Ghana’s TVET agenda.
