The Adakum Educational Foundation has been operating since 1998 and was formally incorporated as a public 501-C-3 organization in 2006, with the following broad mission:

“To provide financial support to the L & A Memorial Academy in Ghana, West Africa in its mission to promote education, to help alleviate hunger, to provide increased healthcare awareness to disadvantaged children and their families; to work to reduce illiteracy, poverty, and poor health conditions in Africa by creating and supporting programs dedicated to improving the education and health of disadvantaged children and their families.”

Within this broad mission, the Foundation has laid out the following specific programs and activities that it seeks to promote and support within the school environment. We believe the school setting is one of the most effective and efficient ways to reach and deliver services to children, their parents and the immediate community.

(A) L & A MEMORIAL ACADEMY,(www.l-amemorialacademy.org)

This is the first school that the Foundation is directly supporting in Ghana and will serve as a model for other school support in Ghana and other African countries. The school was started in 1998 with 3 nursery children in a small hut in Mallam, one of the poorest areas on the outskirts of Accra, Ghana. It is now housed in a brick complex with 325 children and 32 teaching and support staff. The school goes from Nursery (2 year olds) to the 8th grade (14 year olds).

• The Foundation seeks to provide support to build the school into one of the finest schools for the education and training of young people.
• The Foundation seeks to replicate the success model of the L &A Memorial Academy in other parts of Ghana and other countries in Africa.

Academic Programs

1. Science: For Ghana and other African countries to fully develop their economies and keep up with the pace of the world’s technological changes, we must have a well educated and skilled labor force. The Foundation seeks to promote such opportunities.
2. Mathematics: Mathematics is the pillar on which many fields are built: science, technology, economics, architecture, and engineering, to name a few. Without a solid foundation in mathematics, students are at a deep disadvantage. They are unable to compete in today’s arena.
3. Modern Languages: Given the colonial histories of the African countries the Foundation believes that one of the surest ways to stop the ethnic and tribal conflicts that are going on all over the continent is by educating the mass population in the basic national and regional languages of English and French to provide a common means of communication and resolution of conflicts.

Humanitarian Needs

At L&A Memorial Academy, each child is provided FREE Breakfast every morning, and subsidized lunches, and for many of them, that will be the only decent meal they will eat all day.

Basic Healthcare

It is a sad fact that many children in Africa do not get early medical check-ups either because there are no doctors or clinics or that the families cannot afford it. And so ordinary treatable diseases become debilitating illnesses over time and cause unnecessary death. The Foundation therefore promotes and supports basic preventive health care:

The school provides FREE School Based Basic Health Care for the children and their parents with the help of a volunteer public health doctor. We are desperately seeking medical supplies of all kinds to stock the school clinic and funds to pay minimum stipend to the doctor, Dr. Samuel Nyarko, and one staff nurse.

Fight Against Malaria

Malaria is a leading killer in Ghana and other African countries, yet with concerted effort and coordinated policies, this disease can be controlled and prevented. The Foundation operates a volunteer group, Teachers Against Malaria Epidemic, (TAME), that installs free mosquito nets in the homes of the school children and throughout selected communities.

Sports And Physical Activities

Sports and physical activities are recognized as effective tools to promote healthy minds and bodies in children and reduce childhood obesity. The Foundation is committed to promoting these activities in the schools and among the youth in the community.

As the African youths embrace the western cultures and music, including Hip-Hop, it is also important that those unique African cultures be preserved and shared with the rest of the world. The Foundation is committed to supporting this effort

Teacher Improvement Programs

With limited resources many teachers are not able to improve themselves through continued education or specialized training. The teachers’ increased knowledge will in turn benefit the children they teach. The Foundation seeks to offer assistance and support in this important area.

Global Citizenship

With the advent of jet travels and the Internet, the world has become a global village with rapid exchanges of ideas and knowledge and interdependencies for the survival of the human race. The Foundation seeks to encourage students from the US, Europe and all over the world to establish e-pal relationships with students in Ghana and other African countries.

Environmental Issues

It is a fact that our Global Environment is rapidly being degraded with pollution and destruction of our air, rivers, forests and the land. The problem is even more severe in Africa with consequences of draughts, famine and spread of diseases. The Foundation seeks to spread this awareness.

(B) GIRLS EDUCATION ENHANCEMENT PROGRAM (GEEP)

A FREE 16 weekends, "Boot Camp" like, intensive, tutorials for Junior High School girls from rural/village schools in Ghana to prepare and improve their capacity to pass the High School Entrance Examination to gain admissions into, and excel in Senior High Schools in Ghana. The Girls Education Enhancement Program (GEEP) is a special initiative to change and improve the lives of these rural (village) girls.

The Gender Gap:

It is an acknowledged fact that fewer girls in Africa get educational opportunities, and the few that do are mostly from the cities and urban areas. The girls in the rural areas and villages are always at a disadvantaged for a variety of reasons:

• Lack of good schools, good teachers and educational material and resources.
• In many areas, school classes are held under the shade of trees;
• Girls are assigned the house and farm chores, of cooking, cleaning washing, baby sitting, fetching water, and planting, etc, and never have time to study
• Many parents simply don't have the resources, or don't want to spend the money to pay for the extra classes and tutorials that these girls need to do well in school. After all, they will soon leave home to marry.

The Tragedy:

The tragedy for these failing girls:

• Many of them are doomed to lives of hardships on village farms and never get the chance to realize their potentials.
• Some fall victims to human trafficking and end up on the streets of Accra and other big European cities as child prostitutes;
• Others end up as child brides and as 2nd/3rd wives to village elders who only use them for sex and child bearing;
• Still others go to their early graves from dangerous child births, because they themselves, are babies!
• For many of them who survive into adulthood, the poverty cycle just continues.

Goals And Objectives:

• Increase the proportion of girls from rural communities getting admission into, and succeeding in Senior High Schools in Ghana.
• Build the self confidence and self image of these rural girls so as to succeed in school and in life
• Expose them to opportunities and careers beyond the rural (village) farm life
• Save them from the doomed lives of hardships on the village farms; child brides as 2nd/3rd wives of village elders and early child births
• Fulfill the Millennium Development Goals #2: Universal Primary Education and #3: Gender equality and empowerment of women.

Program Description;

The Girls Education Enhancement Program (GEEP) will be hosted at the L & A Memorial Academy School complex in Mallam Accra, and managed from the Accra Offices of the Adakum Educational Foundation. It will start on the first Friday of February, each year, and run for 16 weekends.

• For the 2014 pilot program, 23 girls, in the final year of their Junior High School, grades (8/9), will be selected from rural community schools in the Greater Accra Region, for ease of transportation.
• The selection will be done in consultation with the Local School Administration, the Community Leaders, Chiefs and elders; and with the consent of the parents.
• The selected girls will be picked up from an assembled area in the village that Friday afternoon and brought to the L & A Memorial Academy school complex. They will travel with a female chaperon from the village community to provide the girls a comfort level.
• A couple of the classrooms will be converted into secured sleeping quarters with folding beds, mattresses, blankets, and pillows. They will be provided with assorted toiletries.
• Specialized volunteer tutors will be recruited to handle the various subjects of Math, English, Reading, Science, ICT and vocational (sewing).
• The program will concentrate on the critical areas of the examination syllabus.
• They will stay from Friday afternoon till Sunday afternoon when they will be driven back home.
• They will be provided FREE healthy breakfasts, lunches and dinners.

Program Details:

• Orientation upon arrival at the L&A Academy School complex; Dinner, get to “know each other” sessions; entertainment.
• Saturday: a tour of the L&A School compound and facilities; tour of City of Accra; dinner and entertainment.
• Sunday: campus service; distribution of home works, reading material etc; trip back home 2nd to 15th Weekend
• Friday upon arrival, light work in the computer lab
• Saturday: early morning exercise, breakfast and intensive academic work; visit and lecture by a prominent female; dinner and entertainment;
• Sunday; early campus service; some more work; dismissal and trip back home with reading assignments and home works.
• In between, tests, quizzes and examinations to determined the level of progress.
• Parents weekend; parents will be invited to come and visit with their girls. Last Weekend (16th)
• Farewell party; pep talk; tour of the City; and some tears!

How You Can Help:

In the US, tax deductible donations can be made to the Adakum Ed Foundation in the form of a check and mailed to our address, or online by Paypal at our website: www.admef.org In kind donations will also be accepted; educational material and supplies. In Ghana, donations can be made in the local cedi currency to the Adakum Ed Foundation (GH), by contacting the local President Grace Asiam: 0277-889133. Your donation will qualify as charitable contribution under the Ghana Tax Laws and Regulations.

First Geep Class Starts On Friday, February 7th 2014!!!!