Our volunteers will seek to collect new backpacks, school supplies and monetary donations from individuals, organizations and big businesses. A $20 per child (20*50 = $1,000) sponsorship can go a long way in securing the pre-assembled backpacks filled with essential school supplies for the kids in need.

The education program will target one school at a time with focus on those taken the National Primary School Examination (NPSE) at beginning of the school year in September 2019. Support will be expanded to cover more schools and pupils with funding availability.

We envisage the project to help complement the Government of Sierra Leone’s effort in delivery of its flagship free education initiative to some 1.5 m school children (from pre-primary to senior secondary) launched Monday August 20^th, 2018 for a 5-years phased out process.  We want to be with the government, the kids; mainly the underprivileged gets to start the school year confident and prepared to succeed academically.

The pilot school will be RC Model School, in Bo, Southern Sierra Leone where Peter Vandy attended primary school. Since government will be paying tuition and providing uniforms, this project would be focus on the provision of teaching and learning materials.  

At beginning of school year September 2020, the project team will travel from the US to Sierra Leone to consult and coordinate with stakeholders and make presentations to the school and deserving pupils. Our visit to the school will be unannounced on first day of school in order to observe and identify firsthand those students in dire need of school supplies. Following the screening and identification process, project team will officially make the presentation the next day.  

Program would also be looking into the aspect of soliciting and collection of used shoes and clothing’s for future donations to the schools alongside the school ready supplies. In rural Sierra Leone, a good number of kids go to school bare footed, and for those children, school may not be attractive and sensed as embarrassing. The support of free shoes to improvised kids has health implications since going to school bare places the kid in direct contact with infected ground with high risk of soil transmitted diseases that easily penetrates the skin through bare feet.