Lady Heike Nursery School was established in 2003 by Molly Yankey and Heike Meier. Molly had become aware that when the people of the village of Akatakyiwa worked ,their children (under 5 years) were left in the village with insufficient care or taken to work on the farm or to sit on the roadside where their mothers were selling goods. Heike was then living with Molly as a volunteer.
They decided to establish the nursery school to provide care, education and food for the young children. The aim is to provide support for the families who must work full-time and cannot afford childcare, which forces them to take young children into dangerous work environments rather than nurturing educational settings. It is also to provide the best start to the children in terms of giving them a nutritious meal once a day and setting them off on the path to education. It is hoped that the families will realize the importance of education for both girls and boys, and ensure that once they leave Lady Heike, they go on to complete their education at basic and senior levels.
The chief of the village loaned a building on the Accra-Cape Coast road to Molly for use as the school. Gradually, with the help of Africa’s Future set up by another volunteer, Sarah Holloway, contributions are made to paying the teacher’s salaries and providing the children with 1 meal a day. Another school building was constructed with the help of the British NGO, Projects Abroad, but the building had not been completed due to lack of funds.
OTTN’s work with Lady Heike Nursery School:
- OTTN stepped in to complete this building in 2015, providing the materials and labour to finish the cement work, add ceilings, window and doorframes, shutters and doors, painting, and school desks and chairs.
- OTTN makes a monthly commitment to pay the teacher’s salaries and provide a hot lunchtime meal for each child attending the school. In the 2015/2016 academic year there are 78 children benefitting from this.
- At Christmas OTTN gave ‘Santa Sacks’ to each child that attends the school, with a bag of rice and a bottle of oil distributed to the families of current and past students.
- OTTN is in the process of making new playground equipment to replace the rusted, broken and dangerous equipment that sat in the playground of the nursery school. This is being made with the support of the following: Mr Mono Sethi of Sethi Brothers has provided the steel at cost, Mr Addi Sethi of Premier Steel had donated the paint at no cost, Mr Brehen Majdoub of Pro-Matrix is making the playground equipment at cost. OTTN is paying Sethi Brothers and Pro-Matrix, covering the costs associated with transport, and purchasing the materials needed to cement the equipment into the ground.
Looking forward: Lady Heike Nursery School is accessed from either the busy main road on which it sits, or by a forest footpath that passes to the village behind. OTTN will, in 2016, put safety barriers between the old school building and the main Accra-Cape Coast road (costing to be completed). OTTN will also provide a footbridge and guttering to enable the children to reach the school from the village during the rainy seasons (costing to be completed). OTTN will also continue to pay the monthly cost of the teachers’ salaries and children’s food.