In Sierra Leone, access to education remains a significant challenge, particularly for girls. Despite progress in recent years, many girls still face barriers such as poverty, early marriage, cultural norms, and lack of resources that prevent them from attending school. As a result, they miss out on the opportunity to fulfill their potential and contribute to their communities and the nation at large.

Our project is helping to address this issue by providing education opportunities specifically tailored to empower girls in Sierra Leone.

Only 54% of enrolled girls in Sierra Leone complete their primary education. The most significant barriers to the ongoing education of girls in Sierra Leone are school-related costs, poverty, sexual abuse, early pregnancies, and teen marriages. Due to a lack of social safety nets in Sierra Leone, girls from poor and marginalized families are denied access to primary education. They fall through the cracks, ending up in dead-end, hopeless situations.   Your support is making a difference in girls' lives like Isata's.

Meet Isata...
Isata is a child of a single parent. Isata was out of school, because her mother could not afford to pay for her schooling. Her mother is a hawker of charcoal and Isata works alongside her. They live in one of the slums of Freetown. Now with the support and sponsorship provided by Develop Africa, Isata is enrolled in school and is now in class six. Though she still hawks charcoal after school to augment the family income, she does very well in school. She is always among the first five positions. Isata and her mother are very grateful to Develop Africa for supporting her education. She wants to be a teacher when she grows up.

Thank YOU, because of your continued support Isata and other girls like her are going to school to achieve their goals.

How Will This Project Solve This Problem?
This project will provide scholarships for girls in Sierra Leone to support their continued education, and girl mothers will be equipped with marketable skills and business startup funds to generate regular income to become self-sufficient. The funds will be provided to the families to help cover school-related costs such as books, uniforms, school supplies, transportation, school lunches, etc.

Potential Long-Term Impact
Investing in girls' education is not only a matter of social justice but also an intelligent investment in the future of Sierra Leone. By providing girls with access to quality education and empowering them to reach their full potential, we can break the cycle of poverty, drive economic growth, and build a more inclusive and equitable society.

At-risk girls will become emancipated women when given the chance to be well-educated and develop into useful, gainfully employed, and self-sufficient citizens. Receiving support to continue and complete their education will allow them to break out of the vicious cycle that entraps unskilled and resource-poor girls.

Per UNICEF, In country after country, educating girls yields spectacular social benefits for the current generation and those to come. An educated girl tends to marry later and have healthier children. The children she does have will be more likely to survive; they will be better nourished and better educated. She will be more productive at home and better paid in the workplace.

She will be better able to protect herself against HIV/AIDS and assume a more active role in social, economic, and political decision-making throughout her life. UNICEF aims to get more girls into school, ensure that they stay in school and are equipped with the basic tools they need to succeed in later life.

• Educating girls is crucial as this impacts the family and the entire nation.
   
• UNICEF believes it's simply the case that when you have healthy, well educated and emancipated women, these women in turn rear healthy, well-educated and emancipated children.” 
   
• "To educate girls is to reduce poverty," says Kofi Annan.
   
• According to UNESCO, “education and poverty eradication are inextricably bound”.
   
• This is all the more reason why there should be an increased focus on the education of girls.