EDUCATION FOR HOPE

One of the most significant barriers to education for school age children in low-income countries is access to and distribution of school buildings, particularly in the most socially and economically disadvantaged communities. Where school buildings exist, in rural and remote communities, they usually very far and have significant infrastructural limitations whereby they are in overall poor condition, built with mud bricks and thatched roof without the basic amenities such as latrines.

The implications of access to and distribution of school building and the infrastructural limitations of existing school buildings are reduced primary enrollment rates of school-aged children in remote and rural areas and increased inequity facing the most economically disadvantaged.

The overall objective of this program is to expand access to and improve the infrastructural environment of school building in the most at-need communities Africa, through the rehabilitation and construction of school buildings

While school fees in primary schools have been abolished in Sierra Leone, primary education still does not remain completely free. There are numerous unofficial fees that school charge families in addition to hidden cost such as travel, uniforms, extracurricular activities, tutorial, exercise books, supplies, and the loss of work that the child may have done to support the family during school hours that impact school enrollment rates.

In the Sierra Leone Integrated Household Survey, “economic difficulties,” is cited as the one of the primary reasons why children do not attend school in Sierra Leone.