Background:

Education is a basic human right that enable boys and girls reach their full potential in every society. Thousands of children in Sierra Leone continue to stay out of school. MEYE-SL is a charity organization that works at grass root level in Sierra Leone, promoting education for orphans, disadvantaged children and youth to increase self-sufficiency and long-term sustainability and further embarking on projects that empower youth and children to step up as leaders in their communities. The organization in 2017 started supporting ten (10) vulnerable children with school fees, school uniforms, shoes, bags, notebooks, textbooks, pens, and pencils to help aid their learning process. The organization have further been involved in advocating and motivating parents on the importance of early childhood education more especially the girl’s child within the Kori Chiefdom, Moyamba District. This has helped to ignite much interest amongst many vulnerable children and parents within the chiefdom. It has further helped most of the vulnerable children to learn how to prevent illness and improve overall health, build, and maintain infrastructure, manage personal and professional relationships, understand, and advocate for basic rights, and secure their livelihoods.

We promote education and develop skills that improve literacy, health and welfare for long term self-sufficiency, and improve the livelihoods of vulnerable children to uplift them from poverty. We achieve these objectives by providing educational and skills training for the poorest children in the community. Only by helping people to help themselves can we hope to improve livelihoods and encourage long term self-reliance and sustainability, and this will be achieved through education and skills training; by providing the right skills to empower people and increase opportunities of employment and self-reliance. Our educational sponsorship programme has helped to increase the number of vulnerable children going to school in realizing their dreams of going to university, to help to arm them with the courage and self-confidence to better themselves, families, communities, and ultimately their next generation.

We have been working in synergy with community stakeholders, schools and parents in Kori Chiefdom, Moyamba District. The goal is to further engage in raising awareness of the need for early childhood education and helping to reinforce the rights of children affected by violence, neglect, and social exclusion with an opportunity to access quality education. This has been very important in achieving the vision of the organization, because when children are educated, they are armed with the courage and self-confidence to better themselves, families, communities, and ultimately their next generation.

Key Activities:

1. We visit lower and high schools, to mobilize and motivate school going children and setup educative social and health clubs that help to change of attitude effectively and efficiently towards quality learning outcome among young people in Sierra Leone.
2. To mentor and coach children and youth on leadership roles and transformation, this enables the children and youth to develop solutions for desirable social change in our community.
3. To advocate and motivate parents on the importance of early childhood education more especially the girl’s child within the Kori Chiefdom, Moyamba District.
4. Guide rural parents/guardians to participate in initiative by making products for sale locally, and thus get to make additional income, moving from helplessness to truly striving communities that are self-reliant.
5. Facilitate support for vulnerable children, through support with learning materials like uniforms, bags, shoe, books, pens, pencils etc. in helping to aid their learning process.