Projects
- Support to Grass Roots Orphan Care Centers, Malawi
- Pens and Pads for Progress, Liberia
- Malawi Youth Initiative
- Completed Projects
Pens and Pads for Progress, Liberia
October 2006 - Present
In partnership with the Liberian Ministry of Education, Goods for Good is providing essential support to 40% of Liberian schoolchildren. Following 14 years of Civil War, Liberia is working to rebuild its devastated education system. Realizing that education is the key to a brighter future, the Government has made primary education free and compulsory for all children. As a result, children are returning to the classroom by the tens of thousands. However, despite their best efforts, the Liberian Ministry of Education estimates that 85% of public schoolchildren attend school without a pen or paper.
Responding to this situation, Goods for Good collected 400,000 pens and 400,000 pads from major corporations including Barr Pharmaceuticals, BIC, Bristol-Meyers Squibb, Johnson & Johnson and Sanofi-Aventis. At the time of collection, most of these items were gathering dust in warehouses or were slated to be destroyed. Today, all 77 tons of materials are in the hands of schoolchildren.
In June 2007, Goods for Good received a report on the success of the Pens and Pads for Progress Initiative in Liberia. This project has has reached hundreds of thousands of children throughout the country and proved that something as simple as a pen and pad of paper can have a huge impact on a child’s life. Hawah Goll-Kotchi, Liberia’s Deputy Minister of Education for Administration, highlighted the power of this program in her letter to Goods for Good:
"In some communities, the distribution teams had to carry the supplies in canoes or walk sometimes four-five hours to get to a school. During the distribution, all the children were dancing. For many of them, these items were crucial for the exams, as supplies are not easily gotten in these remote villages and towns.
Life is hard for the children living in many rural communities. Although the ministry distributed school supplies, these items are never enough to last the school year. The pens and pads donated by Goods for Good came at an opportune time. The main recipients of these items were children in grades 3 – 12. In this group, were the 6th, 9th and 12th graders who were scheduled to take the national exams given by the West African Examinations Council. Children in these classes were particularly targeted and issued additional pens and pads to assist them in the preparation and the sitting on these important testing instruments."