Spotlight on PACF, Ghana
Aiding the Retention of Trafficked Children in School
September, 2005. West Africa is presently experiencing an alarming increase in the incidence of child trafficking. The phenomenon is particularly widespread along the coastal belt of Ghana, where children are trafficked to work in the fishing communities along the Volta Lake. Others are sent to work on cocoa farms and plantations, or in stone quarries and mines.
Local NGO Parent and Child Foundation (PACF), winner of a Winrock CIRCLE "Urgent Action contract," has been working to raise awareness about child trafficking in Kokrobitey and its environs in the Ga District (Greater Accra region), by encouraging trafficked and at-risk children to attend school. With timely support from CIRCLE, PACF has provided value-added to a local ILO/IPEC project and helped to retain some newly enrolled and reinserted children in school.
In the first part of its CIRCLE project, PACF undertook critical infrastructure improvements on the temporary Junior Secondary Level structure. The school teachers, pupils and community participated in the design and the construction plan. The improvements served not only as an incentive for children to attend school regularly, but also to raise awareness and interest among the community members on the relevance of education and the particular problem of child trafficking in their area.
Next, PACF began the harder work of trying to ensure that trafficked children who are reinserted into school through the IPEC and CIRCLE programs do not drop out. PACF has provided two years of advance tuition for 40 trafficked children (30 boys and 10 girls), to help them catch up and cope with academic work at their various educational levels. The lessons are delivered in a friendly manner that is easy for these traumatized children to follow and understand. Other financial support from the project has covered the provision of school supplies and food for these students. In addition, the organization has established educational grants for 10 in-school but at-risk children (6 girls and 4 boys).
In the short span of their 3-month Urgent Action project, PACF succeeded in raising the notice of the community for the long-term, and in encouraging trafficked and at-risk children to attend school in the short term. Prospects for their retention in school look very good, thanks to the great groundwork and support of PACF and the recent initiative of the government of Ghana in ensuring universal primary education. Under the government’s Ghana Education Service, public schools throughout the country should have funds to support all children for the 2005-2006 academic year. While disbursal is not yet complete, the program is underway. In the event that PACF’s CIRCLE target school receives its full allotment, the scholarship funds will be used to cover the children’s other education requirements (counseling, food, clothing, books, etc.).
The children have been monitored and are more regular in their class work and school attendance. A remarkable outcome is that several of the children in the lower primary grades are quickly learning to write, read, and speak English. This has instilled a degree of confidence in them and enabled them to relate better with their peers. This project, in a very short time, has contributed to the goal of strengthening formal, non-formal, and transitional education systems that encourage working children, and those at risk of working, to attend school.
