July , 2009

Ambassador’s Scholarships Helps Girls Stay in School

Students in Masiaka School in Sierra Leone

A normal day for a typical 13-year-old rural schoolgirl in Sierra Leone starts at 5:00 am to fetch water from the nearest well or river. She may make several trips and carry as much as 10 gallons before starting out without breakfast on the long walk to school. For many village girls, the nearest school could be several miles away. With public transportation lacking in most areas of the country, students walk an average of two hours a day between home and school, through the heat of the dry season and the downpours of the rainy season.

Classes generally go from 8:00 am to 1:00 pm. Then it is time to walk home and help parents in the field to cultivate rice, cassava, or other vegetables. The work lasts until night falls and the family returns home to consume their only meal of the day. There is no time for homework since girls are needed work the family fields to help generate income to help offset school fees that run about U.S. $30 a year. Most people in Sierra Leone live on less than a dollar a day. Not surprisingly, most girls never finish school. They drop out an early age to look for work in the city or to start families at an early age. Many have their first child about the age of 15. In addition, to ending their schooling, having children at such a young age can also lead to fistula problems and increase child and mother mortality rates.

Since 2004, the U.S. Government’s Ambassador’s Girls’ Scholarship Program has helped girls stay in school despite the pressure to drop out. Through scholarships that include tuition, books, school equipment, uniforms and shoes, the program provides basic literacy and improved educational opportunities in order to build leadership capacity in girls nine to fourteen years old. This year alone, the 3,000 girls and 1, 200 boys across six Districts have benefited from the U.S. $2 million program. The selection criterion is rigorous. At one typical school, 48 students were selected from a pool of 689 candidates.

Aminata Mansaray entered the program at St Ambrose School in 2005. She hopes to attend university to study accounting.” Before going to bed every night, I study two hours thanks to the program,” she said.

For Aminata and thousands of other young students in Sierra Leone, the Ambassador’s Girls Scholarship Program has made a brighter future possible.