EducAid Community Working Together: Lloyd Igunbor & Carolyne Beckett

Lloyd Igunbor – one of Miriam’s past students from Salesian College, Battersea – has spent the past couple of months organising and packing a container full of donations destined for Freetown. He has been travelling around the country picking up donated items from collection centres – usually friends and family of the charity – in preparation for the final shipping date in December. As you can imagine, this is no small feat, so he has asked Miriam to spread the word to help drive some high quality donations to ensure that the container is full of things the schools really need.

Whilst working in one of the Ebola testing labs in Sierra Leone last year, Carolyne Beckett met Miriam through one of Miriam’s old schools friends, Julia Yelloly, who was on the same team. She visited two of EducAid’s sites, and was introduced to some of our wonderful students. Upon her return, Carolyne felt compelled to assist EducAid in any way she could. Earlier this month, Carolyne started to organise a fundraising drive on Facebook to help fill up the container. Based in Bristol, Carolyne has asked all of her friends and family to donate what they can from the area, which will then be transported down to Lloyd’s collection centre in West London.

Here is Carolyne’s facebook post:

As this shows, EducAid relies heavily on the generosity of our donors. Our students are always extraordinarily happy to receive new clothing. Many of you will know that we do not make our students wear uniforms, but we do insist that their clothes are clean and in decent repair – we are at school at the end of the day!! – so these donations really do help our students in this matter.

If you are able to contribute anything to this wonderful fundraising effort from two of our community, you can contact Farah here and she will send you in the right direction. For those living close to Bristol you should coordinate with Carolyne, and for those living in the London area you should coordinate with Lloyd. Just for the sake of clarity, here is the list of essential items:

• Second-hand clothes and shoes (esp. flip flops/crocs) ages 3-adult.
• Boys and girls underwear
• Black shoes (a requirement to take exams) ages 11-adult.
• Books - non Euro-centric (i.e. not full of skateboards and microwaves etc) e.g. fantasy/factual/thought-provoking
• Educational resources esp. children's encyclopaedias, dictionaries, 
• thesauruses
• Blank CDs and DVDs (for recording lessons for remote teaching)
• Old laptops (2010+ software please)
• Old microscopes and other resources for teaching at secondary level
• Sharable hardwearing toys e.g. Balls (deflated) and treats

As if organising this donation drive wasn’t enough, Carolyne is also doing a fun run in November then to prepare for the Filthy Girl Mud Run. If you are able to sponsor her directly for her run, you can do so from this link.

Carolyne sums up her post like this:

"Any money or gifts donated will go directly into helping the children. EducAid is a corruption-free zone whose trustees cover any administrative costs.
Come on Facebook let's make a difference!!"

Thank you very much both Carolyne and Lloyd for your amazing work in bringing this together. Without the committed efforts from the EducAid community we would not be half as strong as we are!

If you have not watched our new video, you can do so on the homepage of our website or on facebook. Please do share this post and the video to help spread our message.


EducAid – Learning for Life in Sierra Leone

AJ & Kai Making us Proud in Magbeni

One cornerstone of our mission, and something that EducAid has always been immensely proud of, is being an intrinsically Sierra Leonean organisation, and being cemented in the centre of our communities. From the very inception of the charity we committed to establishing our roots in Sierra Leone - not to fall in to the trap of many NGOs - but to empower Sierra Leoneans themselves to initiate their own change. This week, Miriam’s visit to our school at Magbeni revealed an initiative devised by some of the staff there that encapsulates this very fact, better than we could ever describe it. This is Miriam’s account:


“I visited Magbeni yesterday and found myself incredibly touched by their latest activities at the school. On the suggestion of AJ, our site coordinator there, and his deputy, Kai, the staff members have been ‘taxing’ themselves for a development fund. Their idea was to use this time and money in order to be able to do things they perceive as necessary within the school. To reiterate, this was an initiative dreamed up entirely by AJ and Kai – what a fantastic and entrepreneurial thing to do.

During the height of the Ebola crisis they contributed 1 Friday each and built 10 large group work tables and 20 benches; they put in a new ceiling in the library as well as laying a new floor. This week I met a new building that has been built as a library - it is nearly finished. Their attitude is so lovely and encouraging, I was really impressed.

The work that they have undertaken within the school is not the end of it. AJ (in blue) and his deputy, Kai, are both past pupils, and they are so incredibly committed to the EducAid beliefs and really lead the team. The photos of the two of them is with their other construction project, something that they have persuaded the community to help them with i.e. a couple of outside classrooms that can accommodate everyone in the village. They are determined that they, and the community that we are helping, will not force EducAid to carry the whole burden. It is a very very unusual attitude, and in great contradiction to the usual dependence and sense of entitlement that people often feel when they’ve been reliant on charity and aid for such a long time. It really reminds us of how much work that we’re doing to change things here – not just education, nor housing and food, but real social change. I’m so proud of those boys and long may them keep it up!”

I can do nothing but to reiterate Miriam’s words here. It is an immensely powerful story and one that signals such positive change in these communities. Through our educational morals we have inspired others to come together and work for the greater good. Go AJ, Go Kai, and Go Magbeni!

We’re beginning to accept our students in to our schools – running through the necessary precautions as we always have - and classes will be up and running again very soon. This is such a great story to propel us off in to this period of hard work, we can say nothing but thank you.


It is when one considers the compassion and generosity of these small acts that we can really appreciate the impact of the hard work that we do. It reiterates our mission and motto: Learning for Life in Sierra Leone.