Children in Liberia benefit from education project

Pupils at a community school in Jallabah Town, Liberia

A rapid-education project that Plan ran in Sierra Leone for out-of-school children traumatised by the country's civil war, is helping children in neighbouring Liberia to return to school.

The project helped 19,000 children in Sierra Leone get back into learning and aims to be as successful with returning Liberian children back to school. Plan’s partner organisation Forum for African Woman Educationalists (FAWE) is running the project after Plan played a key part in implementing it.

Plan’s Regional Learning Advisor for Sierra Leone Sven Coppens said; “Most of Liberia's primary schools were destroyed during the 14-year civil war, and only children from wealthier families received any kind of education, in the private faith-based schools which did manage to stay open.”

Community involvement

The communities were keen to get involved in the project, selecting the teachers themselves and providing land for the non-formal learning centres, and in some cases even helping to build them. They then sent the most underprivileged children to school, and prepared food for them. The teachers received training in the national primary curriculum, and also in psychosocial support and peace and health education.

Sven continued; “When the project ends in July this year, FAWE will have helped 4,000 children prepare for school in community-based centres, and have trained 100 teachers. The Liberian government has said it will place all these children in formal schools, and put the teachers on its payroll, as regular teachers.”