About CYE Elementary and Junior High School...For Volunteers

General Questions

1. How did you hear about the GWF Volunteer Program?

I learned about the GWF Volunteer Program through the Executive Director who contacted me and visited the offices of the organization at the camp.

2. Why do you want to participate in the GWF Volunteer Program?

We intend to participate in the GWF Volunteer Program so that volunteers are placed in our schools and other programs to help us build our capacity in order to realize our goals and to create an atmosphere to provide quality education.

3. How many volunteers can you host at one time? 

We are able to host eight volunteers at one time.

4. Have you hosted volunteers in the past? If so, how many? Can GWF contact them?

Yes. We have received ten volunteers.

5. How will you be able to transport volunteers to and from the airport?

Volunteers will be picked up from the airport via taxi.

Housing and Living

6. Will you be able to provide/obtain housing for volunteers?

Yes

7. Please give a brief description of the volunteer housing.

The guesthouse is located at the camp. It has an inside bathroom with flush toilet, a bed, and mosquito net.

8. What kind of community will the volunteers live in? (I.e. rural, suburb, small/large town, city, etc.)

The volunteers will be living at the Buduburam Refugee Camp. This camp was established in 1990 as a result of the war in Liberia and now hosts over forty five thousand refugees. It is forty-five minutes drive from Accra, the capital city of Ghana.

9. Volunteer housing must have a fan, bed, pillow and sheets, and mosquito netted windows, and a flushable toilet (running water is not necessary). Besides these amenities what else can you offer?

They will be provided tables, chairs and other things within our reach.

10. Will the volunteers have their own room? Are there options for volunteers to share a room?

Depending upon how many volunteers are present they will either have their own room or be asked to share one with another volunteer.

11. Do you have running water at your volunteer housing? If not, what is the main water source?

No, but we buy water on a daily basis.

12. What type of setting is your volunteer housing located in? Please give a brief description of your town/village and the surrounding areas.

The volunteers will be living at the Buduburam Refugee Camp. It is a forty-five minutes drive from Accra.

13. Volunteers must be provided three meals a day. How will you do this? Where will they take their meals?

They will be fed at our guest house with a hired cook to cook their food.

14. Will laundry be done for volunteers? If so, by whom? Cost?

The amount of $50.00 will be needed to do the laundry per month for all the volunteers.

15. How far away is the closest internet café?

It is less than five minutes walk from the guesthouse.

About the School

16. Please provide all contact information for your school including location.

Center for Youth Empowerment Elementary and Junior High School

C/o State House, P.O.Box 46, Accra, Ghana

Email: empoweryouths@yahoo.com

Mobile: 0243250447

18. Is your school and volunteer housing located in the same area?

Yes

19. If volunteers must provide for their own transportation, what will the costs be?

No transportation is needed in this regard.

20. How many students does your school have?

Three hundred students.

21. Which levels does your school contain? How many students are in each class?

From nursery to Junior High Level and each contains from thirty to forty students.

22. Do the students pay tuition to attend school? If so, how much? No,they only pay maintenance fees, see the below chart:

23. Is your school registered within the school district?

Yes, we are registered with the Central Educational Board of Buduburam Camp

24. Does your school receive money/materials from government assistance or from any other organizations or institutions?

No

25. What subjects are taught at your school?

English, Mathematics, Science, History, Peace Education, Health Science, Spelling, Writing, Religious Education, French

26. Does your school use a curriculum?

Yes

27. Do you offer any extra-curricular clubs/activities? If so, what? Please give a brief description of each club or activity.

Soccer Team: It is part of the extra curriculum activities that involve the students (Male). The school team plays among themselves and with other schools in the community. It requires getting footballs, sets of jersey, etc...

Kick Ball: It comprises of female students.

Site Seeing: Students are taken to historical sites in Ghana and the various zoos.

After School: Students are taught their lessons after regular classes.

African Costume Day: It is a day set aside for students to be dressed in their African attire and the best dressed students are given some gift items.

Press Club: Students practice journalism, they report campus based news.

Make the Children Happy Program: Programs are organized for the children to play. During these programs, they play, dance, and some refreshments are served at the end of the day.

28. When are your school's breaks?

The school year is run on a terminal basis and there are three terms in a school year. First term runs from September 6 to December 6, second term runs from January to April, and third term runs from April to July.

29. What are school hours?

The school runs from 7:45 A.M. to 1:30 P.M.

30. How many teachers do you have? Are they all trained teachers?

We have fifteen teachers with four support staff.

31. Does your school practice caning?

No

Volunteer Duties and Other Activities

32. What levels and subjects will be taught by volunteers?

Volunteers will be teaching from Nursery to 9th grade.

33. Besides teaching, what responsibilities and duties will be expected of a volunteer (i.e. running of extra-curricular activities, tutoring, etc.)?

They will be expected to facilitate some extra curriculum activities of their choice, tutoring, helping with some administrative work, running some in-service training program for our local teachers and helping in other activities geared towards uplifting the school .

34. In what other ways can volunteers help at the school besides teaching? (i.e. school beautification, field trips, construction improvements, fundraising, administration work, etc.) The more ideas you can give us, the better.

We hope volunteers can help in some administrative work, field trips, doing some construction work to enable us to improve and expand the school and engage in fund raising activities intended to get funding for the school so as to underwrite the cost of running the school and most importantly to connect the school to individuals of good will and organizations.

35. How many hours each day will volunteers be teaching or in the school? How many days a week? 

Volunteers will be teaching for five hours and it will be from Monday to Friday.

36. Will volunteers be permitted/encouraged to travel? Can they miss school days? If so, when must they tell about their travel plans (i.e. before arriving, one week in advance)?

Yes, they will be allowed to miss school days and the management should be informed three days before the time of departure for proper adjustment.

GWF Comments:

Our newest volunteer school is still in the trial period to become a partner school and receive funds from GWF. Early signs have proved positive. CYE is a small grassroots organization run by several Liberians who volunteer their days to make life in the camp better. The CYE Elementary and Junior High School is one part of that organization. The organization allows for motivated volunteers to get involved in several aspects of camp life - female empowerment, female issues, peace and reconciliation, and children are other areas to get involved.

About Buduburam:

Situated about 40 minutes west of Accra, the nation's capital, Buduburam, once a large refugee camp, has become its own fully functioning city. Reports and experts have called the camp one of UN's greatest success stories and urges future refugee camps to study the success of the camp. For a lot more information about the Buduburam Refugee Camp and the Center for Youth Empowerment (CYE) go to: http://www.users.on.net/~rmc/youthempowerment.htm

*Last updated: August 2007

For further questions and inquiries regarding our volunteer schools, please contact info@ghanawisdom.org