Margaret Bennett | Article and Photos

La ' Angum Learning Centre

Bantambaari School

Students at Nwodua School

The harmattan blankets West Africa with fine Sahara dust from November through March . The sky is grey and the horizon blurry . Many of the trees are devoid of foliage to conserve moisture during the scorching dry season .

We visited Ghana to assess four schools , as representatives of Rainbow of Hope for Children ( ROHFC ). This small nongovernment organization ( NGO ) operates out of Wainwright and has a special interest in education . Efforts such as these in Ghana are carried out all over the world , including , for example , Tanzania , Indonesia , Brazil , the

Philippines , El Salvador , and Jamaica . I am on the board of directors and volunteered with my husband and another director , Joe Gubbels , to visit Ghana to inaugurate a newly constructed school and assess the needs of three others in impoverished northeastern communities . We were joined there by Alice Azumi Iddi-Gubbels , also a director and resident of Ghana .

We hired a vehicle and a capable driver in Accra and drove north for two days to Tamale . There we learned that before we could venture into the

villages , we were obliged to pay a courtesy call on the local king and chief in his palace . This was the first of many calls to Mamprusi nobility , and the procedure never varied . We paid “ kola money ” to one of the elders , as the chief and elders gathered in the meeting room , then were given bitter kola nuts , which we were to share with others . The meeting concluded with warm invitations to return and visit any time .

Outside the city we unintentionally took the scenic route to visit our first school , Nwodua School , amid a cluster of small mud huts . The school was typical of most Ghanaian schools — long concrete buildings , one for lower elementary , one for upper elementary , and one for junior high , with covered porches on each side . The local chief had donated a piece of land to construct a library , and a capable young mother , Esther Adania Sejoah , had been appointed to manage the project .

The following day we continued to Nalerigu . Construction of a kindergarten in the village of Bantambaari had recently been completed .

26 | arta . net DREAMS FOR THE FUTURE