I told you about the school we saw in Tamale, which I am learning is about what an average school in this area looks like. Here are a couple of pictures of that school.

Our school, NECA (North-Eastern Christian Academy) is a dream of a home missionary here, Emmanuel Mustapha (Muss). He envisioned a school in which students receive an education equivalent to one in America. In the next few years we will expand to have a Senior High and a boarding school.

We had our first Open House last week. It was attended by most parents and we received some positive feedback. One man told me that we are putting Yendi on the map. It is the best school in the area. He said that he could see that children are involved and learning. He believes education is the key to bettering the whole area. He said that these children will not grow up and start tribal wars. They will not think, "I do not like you, I will kill you, or I will burn your house down". These children will use words to solve their problems. It was interesting because the pastor had given a short lesson at the beginning of the open house, which this man was not there for. He told the story of the good Samaritan and stressed that we are all neighbors and should all love each other, no matter the race, tribe or religion. As I have said before, most of our students are from Muslim families, so I pray that we are teaching peace also.

Muss' dream in becoming a reality and I am so thankful to be a part of it. Parents from 60 or 100 kilometers are waiting for the boarding school to open so that they can send their children because they want them to have a quality education. I can not wait to come back in a few years and see a much larger school and a boarding house. And the dream continues. Muss would like to build another school in Bimbilla, about 60 miles south of here. And Rebecca, my roommate, would like to start a mobile school that will go to several surrounding villages and teach children and adults, leaving assignments there for a head adult to oversee. You see, parents here know that education is the key to getting out of poverty and changing lives, but many do not have access to quality education. Many can not even afford public school because they can not purchase books or uniforms. And the public schools are very poor and over crowded. So NECA is changing the lives of almost 100 students.

This past month, I made cupcakes (from scratch) for a girl in my room. I believe it was the first birthday cake she had ever had. We had the cupcakes, sang Happy Birthday and played UNO. When we wrote in our journals that day, "If I could do anything I wanted on my birthday..." All they wanted was cake, and for their mothers to buy rice and bake a chicken. That would be their dream birthday. So this year, each of them will have a cake or cupcakes for their birthdays (I don't know about the chicken and rice).

Other signs that kids are excited. We can hardly keep them out of the library. They want to look at books! My students often spend their recess time in the room practicing reading. Today I was alittle late in writing the daily schedule on the board, so one of the students wrote it for me, but wrote in an extra reading time. I have started an after school program for 6 students and have to turn kids away that want to come in.

How to express the need?

Andrews Dancing in church

I can not begin to express the needs here. I do not understand how some of us can have so much and some can have so little. We had a newspaper reporter ask us some questions about the needs in Ghana, especially in education (He will come back and talk to us some day and wants to write an article). Wow, how do you start. Our school has one small classroom for each grade. We have whiteboards at the front and markers. We have textbooks, but not always enough to go around. So we write the assignment on the board and the students copy it. All students have at least one pencil and we have colored pencils and crayons. We have notebook paper and a library that is pretty good. We have a computer lab, in which 3 or 4 computers work at this time, but they are working on that. And we have toilets and sinks. The children are provided two meals a day. Not what American children would enjoy, but good food for this area. But the supplies I have, including games, flashcards, and art supplies fit in one student desk. That is it. I have two pairs of scissors for 7 students. Yesterday I spent 47 cedis ($35) to purchase scissors, paint, brushes, erasers and pencils for the students to buy with their "good behavior"cards. I also purchased a few more textbooks. But other teachers can not do this as they make around 100 cedis a month (an apple is 1 cedi). But, we are an extremely well supplied school for the area. Last Saturday, while shopping in Tamale, we came across a primary school. It was a long wooden shack, with corrals for classrooms. Each classroom had a very old chalkboard, several benches and papers strew across the floor. For toilets they had a hole in a cement slab with a corrugated tin wall around it. For #2 there was a board with three holes under which were 3 chamber pots. I told Rebecca that I thought it was an abandoned old school, but she pointed out the date on one of the chalkboards... October 3, 2009. Compared to this our school is luxurious.

There is also great needs among the students. Our principal told me that a couple of my students have no supervision at home. I am not talking about latch key kids whose parents come home at 5 or 6:00. Their parents (a mom, or aunt, or grandma) come home very late, around 10:00 or later. So they are left to fend for themselves. Some run around town, some hunt wild game in the bush. The meals at school are the only meals they get. He also mentioned that the students like rice so much better than boiled yams because it is a treat. At home they only get it on special holidays. Imagine rice being a treat! Chicken is also a treat. With apples costing 1 cedi (70 cents) and the average income being around $1 a day, you can imagine that apples, oranges and such are also a rare treat. I taught my students how to make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on Friday. I thought some of them were going to eat the paper they were served on.

One student Andrews lives with his aunt and grandmother and is one that roams the streets and the bush. But he is at church every Sunday with his older brother (not his aunt or grandmother). He has attended school very sporadically until this year, because no one saw to it that he went. He was left to himself and showed up occasionally. He now attends everyday and is so eager it breaks my heart. He begs to read to me. He is a very poor reader, so I asked him if he would like to stay after school a couple of days and get help. He was ecstatic. He was telling everyone. I can not describe the look on his face. I pray, and hope that you will pray with me, that I can teach him to read well this year, and that he can continue with schooling. He says he wants to be a doctor. He is a scholarship kid, but his sponsor can not pay. He is going to school now, but we are looking for a sponsor for him and for several others.

We were without water for a couple of days, but the pastor brought us some large containers and we were able to sponge bathe. We lose electricity often, so our overhead fans don't work and it gets hot fast (air conditioners should be coming this week). We have to cook in a hot kitchen (our house is about 90 or more in the afternoon) and we have no microwave and no food that is easy to cook. But we have food, beds, electricity and water. My children are well educated and have every opportunity available to them. I can not express how little I feel that I am sacrificing, and how little I feel like I am to be admired. And this is not just false modesty. I know that I will return home and eat like a king. I will go to restaurants and movies and get paid an ungodly amount of money. These people will continue on for the rest of their lives in a daily battle, struggling for the basic necessities of life. The children will learn in conditions we would consider unlivable. But they will continue to smile and they will continue to praise God with dancing, clapping and true rejoicing. Today in church we sang, "These are the days of Jehovah" and they rejoiced. A little boy crawled up in my lap, completely uninvited and fell asleep. He slept there through the whole service. The invitation hymn was "Because He Lives" ...

But greater still the calm assurance:This child can face uncertain days because He Lives!

What a promise that was in a place like this!