DPSI Ghana: Discussing Academic Excellence with Teacher Shadrach Quainoo and Students Shriman Jha and Raj Thakwani

Interview with Teacher Shadrach Quainoo and Students Shriman Jha and Raj Thakwani of DPS International Ghana

What do you teach at DPS International Ghana, how long have you taught there and is it different to teaching elsewhere?

DPSI Teacher Shadrach Quainoo: I teach chemistry at the (Cambridge) IGCSE level to Grade 9 and Grade 10, and I also teach AS level chemistry. Aside from teaching students, I also expose them to the practical aspects of what we do through theory and by imparting knowledge. I came to DPS International Ghana in February 2018. The students here are very good, so as a teacher, you have to put in more effort, you have to study, and you have to reset. One amazing thing about DPSI is that you have everything at your disposal. Resources needed for teaching like books, the Internet, training and labs. Joining DPSI has made me a better teacher, and it has made me an international teacher.

What international exposure has benefited you?

Quainoo: DPSI has a standard. We follow the British Cambridge curriculum. The standards of education in Britain, or anywhere in the world, are the same. The experience I would get in the UK would not be much different from the experience I am getting here. I also recently got exposure to the International Junior Science Olympiad (IJSO) in Dubai and that is all because of DPSI.

Tell us about the International Junior Science Olympiad?

DPSI was commenced in the year 2010 aiming for quality education and excellent learning, providing holistic, modern, comprehensive, technology-driven classes right from Creche to A Level.

Quainoo: It is an annual competition for science students who are 15 years of age or younger on December 31st. The Olympiad aims to promote science among students. They are exposed to problem solving, critical thinking, and experimentation. The idea is for the IJSO to positively impact science students. The competition is in three parts. There is theory examination, multiple choice questions and answers, and a practical test. The questions are set by professors from different countries who specialize in fields such as biology, chemistry, and physics. PhD students do the marking, so it tells you that it is a very high standard competition.

How many countries were represented?

Quainoo: There were more than 50 countries that took part in the competition. Students came from places like India, Russia, Thailand, Ghana, Zambia, UAE, and Saudi Arabia. Every country has two teams. Ghana presented Team A and Team B that were made up of six students from three different schools. There were two students from DPS, two from Ghana Christian High, and two students from Galaxy International. Some students were onsite in UAE, and some were online. This was the 18th edition.

Were the students prepared specifically for this competition?

Quainoo: We trained our students in chemistry, physics and biology. We had separate teachers and I took them through chemistry. Another teacher, Mr. Albert, took them through physics, a teacher, Ms. Abiana, who is in India, connected with the students on Zoom, and we had a lab technician, Mr. Seth, who helped with practical aspects.

Are you preparing for any other competitions, or are you focusing on any other big projects this year?

Quainoo: We are now preparing for another competition in Ghana. It’s called the Sharks Quiz competition. DPS students, Shriman Jha and Raj Thakwani, were first runners-up in 2019 and this time they are moving up into the senior category of the competition. We want to win this time.

How difficult was it to prepare for the competition in Dubai?

Student Shriman Jha: The competition by its nature is very hard. The pre-college questions were about things that we do not do in our daily activities. We knew that we were going to face questions that were very challenging. We realized that this year was going to be even tougher because the syllabus underwent a change and the questions were hybrid. They wanted to reduce the amount of cheating. But in the end, we were able to do well.

What was your ranking?

Student Raj Thakwani: At the end we were relieved because we had worked hard. We had to learn a lot of topics with Mr. Albert and Mr. Shadrach that we had never seen before.

Jha: We won two bronze medals. I won a bronze and another student, Ivan from Christian High, won a bronze. We were the only African nation to win more than one medal in the whole competition.

How did it compare to other competitions you have been in?

Jha: This was our first and last time because it is for age 15 and every year the team wants to take its best students, so they take students who are on the borderline of age 15 who are very good. I was selected to go to the 2020 edition, but unfortunately due to coronavirus it was cancelled.

Did you get to meet any students from other countries and what was the overall experience like?

Thakwani: Because of COVID restraints, we didn’t get to meet a lot of people from the competition in Dubai. A lot of countries opted to do the hybrid from home. But apart from that, we met some new people like the others from Ghana and that was fun.

Jha: They wanted to restrict COVID cases. They had bio bubbles and didn’t allow teams from different countries to mingle so everyone was in their own bio bubble.

What do you take from being a student at DPSI?

Thakwani: All the teachers have their own method of teaching, and they help in making the teaching more fun rather than boring and monotonous. Sometimes they crack jokes, and they engage the class more in activities.

Jha: This is my eleventh year at DPS, and I don’t think I would have found a better school because it has exposed me to opportunities like extracurricular activities. I had the chance to do public speaking and go to several Olympiads. There is also team building in the class that take students out of their fields and work to their maximum capacity. Things like music, art and sports.

What courses are you studying and at what level?

Jha: I am an AS level in Grade 11 studying maths, physics, and chemistry.

Thakwani: I am also AS level Grade 11 and I am doing maths, physics, business studies, and computer science.

Are you thinking about what you would like to do in the future yet?

Jha: I want to pursue aerospace engineering in college.

Thakwani: I am expecting most likely to go into computer engineering.

Do you have any final thoughts on the school or the competition that you would like to share?

Jha: I would like to thank the school for the opportunity and for everything they have done in supporting us. I would also like to thank our teachers for helping us prepare for what we thought doing on our own would have been impossible. And I would like to thank my parents for giving me this opportunity to go abroad and study. This competition gave me the opportunity to display some of my leadership skills because I was captain of Team Ghana, and it enabled me to communicate with everyone and prep them. Some things that a leader should do before a major competition. It enabled me to get that opportunity to see some things that I would do in the future as a leader.

Thakwani: I think the competition really helped us see how to do practicals. Within four days we had to do the practicals with people we had never seen before. I think the competition helped us to adapt more quickly and taught us how to survive in the future.

Jha: The competition also helped us learn that even when we thought we didn’t do well, when we were down, we had the opportunity to rise and come back again with more effort. This competition has made our life as AS level students very easy because for physics, chemistry and bio we finished the entire syllabus for this competition. Everything we are doing at school now seems very easy for us because we have been exposed to much greater standards and much harder questions.

ABOUT DPSI GHANA: DPSI was commenced in the year 2010 aiming for quality education and excellent learning, providing holistic, modern, comprehensive, technology-driven classes right from Creche to A Level. With the motto “Service Beyond Self”, DPSI strives to excel the needs of children in Ghana and its neighbouring countries.

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