“The setting up of mothers’ clubs to help in the improvement of education in schools is not a policy mistake, it’s a rewarding endeavor,” said Mr Sori Ceesay, senior education officer for Region 2.
He added: “Poverty is a major threat to children’s learning, educational access and achievements. The establishment of child friendly schools through mothers’ clubs is spelt out as an intervention and therefore highlighted in the 2004-2015 education policy objectives.
“The transfer of knowledge alone offers limited solution for the alleviation of mass poverty. Thus, the involvement of poor women parents to participate in the education of their own children is crucial but requires support to empower them with the basic knowledge in group management and livelihood skills in order for them to be able to cope with the rapid changes, and to help them mobilise their own potentials to make better use of the available resources to improve their livelihood.”
Also speaking, Jim Jeng, the ECD focal person at Regional Educational Directorate-2, said the basic education ministry is committed to support schools and communities through self-initiated mothers’ clubs.
He added: “The initiative is intended to create an enabling child friendly learning environment, especially for girls to enter school, stay in school and finish, as enshrined in vision 2020 and the MDGs.”
The officials made these remarks on Thursday during a day-long training workshop for mothers’ club and school heads held at Kabafita Upper Basic School in Brikama. Organised by Samasang, a Child Fund affiliated federation, in collaboration with the Ministry of Basic and Secondary Education (MoBSE), the event brought together 45 participants.
Addressing the participants, Child Fund’s programme development officer for Bafulotto and Kabafita Community Associations said the collaboration between Saamasang and the basic education ministry is aimed at promoting quality education.
“Quality education cannot be achieved in the absence of mothers. Saamasang started to focus on empowering the mothers’ clubs by preparing a constitution for them and registering it with the attorney general chambers. This will be followed by a five-day training on group management and livelihood skills such as tie and dye and soap making for the mothers’ clubs. Besides that, an amount of D5000 will be given to each club to serve as seed money.”
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