Village leader brings education to the community
Meet Pa Saidu Kanu, the village leader who, wanting a better future for the children in his village, brought the community together to build them a school.
In Sierra Leone, only 1 in every 5 villages has a school which means most children have to make long journeys, often on foot, to reach schools in neighbouring towns. With farming as the main occupation and source of income for most people living in rural communities, education is sometimes pushed aside and children are encouraged to work the land instead.
Children deserve a better future
In one small village in Sierra Leone’s Port Loko District, village leader and Chief Imam of the local mosque, Pa Saidu Kanu decided that the children in his community deserved a better future and so the villagers started to build their own school using locally available materials they could find in the bush such as sticks, ropes and palm leaves.
“We used our own personal resources to support the construction project. We cooked for and supported our workers, financially and otherwise,” Pa explains. The school was a simple structure, one large room divided by boards and sticks to separate the classrooms. By working together, the first school in the village was opened in 2016 for children under the age of 10 with 5 teachers who were paid for by the community members themselves.
Despite this success, the school faced many challenges which hindered its progress and development. These ranged from insufficient school furniture to the lack of school toilets, teaching and learning materials. Eventually the school had to be closed as it did not comply with Ministry of Education regulations.
In the months that followed, the wooden school collapsed during a heavy storm which also left hundreds of properties in the area damaged and destroyed. Amidst these struggles, the community approached Plan International for help after learning that the organisation had built 2 schools in the district as part of their child-friendly learning centre project.
Access to inclusive and safe, quality education
Plan International agreed to help and work began constructing a modern pre-school in the village in July 2019 which was completed in November 2020. Now children from the village and the surrounding areas, have access to inclusive and safe, quality education and the number of pupils enrolled at the school increases each day. The school has 3 classrooms, a head teacher’s office, a toilet block and is fully equipped with furniture and learning materials.
“The project’s objective is to provide girls and boys in the community with access to inclusive, equitable, quality education and early childhood development so that they are better prepared to integrate into primary education,” explains Umu Kpange, Plan International’s Port Loko Office Manager. “The fact that education is a fundamental right for all children urged us to build this solid foundation which helps promote gender equality, child protection, and early childhood development.”
