Having mentioned the idea over a year ago, of getting the parents and families involved in literacy classes, it has taken us too long to get round to starting.  Obai and indeed his wives have been on my case gently reminding and at long last we have started. Ann, Jane and Isata registered over twenty-two…

From 6th to 8th January 2012, the principals from our new partner schools, the target for our Quality Enhancement Programme, attended the Rolal Teacher Training Centre to launch the training cycle. Running small junior secondary schools in rural Port Loko District, these men have a tough task.  One aspect that makes it particularly challenging is…

Isata contemplating a future in development work and communication. The tertiary education options in Sierra Leone often leave me feeling almost desperate.  We preach a message of destruction of inequalities through education but in practice we find that the right connections and the willingness to pay on the side is what really makes it possible…

Emily née Inman Emily is training for the Paris marathon and will run to raise monies for EducAid.  She has set up a Just-Giving page: http://www.justgiving.com/Emily-OHare. Please do support her! We are happy to be able to confirm that, as all overheads are covered by the trustees, all donations will go directly to the project…

http://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/causes/educaidsierraleone If you follow this link, you can raise money for free by doing your online shopping through this link.  Please do, it is very quick and easy to do and EducAid benefits from every online penny you spend. Thank you. If you are interested in knowing more about EducAid’s work with vulnerable young Sierra…

Big smiles for the end of the first course. The new Rolal Teacher Training and Resource centre is in action.  There are a couple of things to finish off in terms of plastering and fixing doors and windows but the centre is usable as is.  It is a wonderful airy space which will be used…

With Jane’s enthusiastic leaping about and charging round the village, with the Sparrows class, we are quite surprised she has only lost her voice! Jane Harris, criminology lecturer from the UK, has been in Maronka for three weeks and is settling in well.  She left her academic work so that she could ‘get her hands…

Mabinty, in class 4, will be able to sit the exams under EducAid Maronka when she gets to the top of the school. In the early days, I had to try and register some of the schools.  I went to the Ministry of Education zillions of times.  I filled in the forms to have them…

This is for all you online shoppers…… If you register online by clicking on the link below, the Easy Fundraising website will send us a cheque periodically with money that gets generated on the side of all your online purchases. Please do.  I just did and it takes only moments.  As most of you are…

The Global Financial Crisis is kicking in.  Reduced giving means that at the meeting with the EducAid trustees this week, we have been told that all discretionary spending must stop and with immediate effect on my return to Sierra Leone, we must do a staff review and reduce staff and we will have to stop feeding the…

…..ready for lift off! Something EducAid would never have afforded in a million years!  A trip to the UK for 12 staff was paid for by the Steve Sinnott Foundation.  The staff have spent a week in the Premier Inn at Euston and after a couple of days of sight seeing, got stuck into an…

Some of this year’s ex-women’s project girls who sat and passed their first round of public exams along with a couple of their Women’s Project teachers.  It is always a big boost to the confidence of the girls coming up behind them when they see that it is an accomplishable feat!  Each year now more…

Mohamed T Koroma Key to our positive discipline systems are our merit and demerit cards.  One young man has truly entered into the spirit of the task at hand.  Mohamed T Koroma has completed his merit card with merits before the first half term of the year [and not a single demerit!] A wonderful effort…

Yayah A Kamara Yayah A Kamara – a quiet smiley member of the junior staff – has not only just won the much prized bag of rice for being the teacher with the best public exam results in this year’s BECE but he has also just discovered that his dream will come true. Yayah studied…

Generally speaking, the public exam results have been very disappointing country wide this year.  However, this has once again, not been the case in EducAid. We have seen student after student come with absolutely excellent grades which opens the doors for their future. This is a sign of great patience and endurance through very difficult…

Staff numbers just over 70 now and we are all re-dispersing after a good but exhausting week together of meetings and training.  The 70+ included a good group of our most recent ex-students who are now joining the ranks of the educators.  Great to see! Term starts on Monday and nearly everything is set. Good…